Lectures on the anatomy and physiology of the intestinal canal : more especially of its mucous membrane : being the Croonian Lectures for 1842, delivered at the College of Physicians / by R. B. Todd.

  • Robert Bentley Todd
Date:
1842
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Lectures on the anatomy and physiology of the intestinal canal : more especially of its mucous membrane : being the Croonian Lectures for 1842, delivered at the College of Physicians / by R. B. Todd. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    18/24 page 18
    We may enumerate three classes of glands :— 1. Brunn's or Brunner's glands. I pre- fer to give to these glands the name duo- denal, for they strictly belong to this por- tion of intestine, and form one of its princi- pal characters. They were discovered and described by J. C. Brunnin 1686. The best mode of displaying them is that which he advises, namely, to slit up the intestine; pin it, with its mucous membrane down- wards, under water ; and then dissect off the serous and muscular coats. The glands will be found arranged in the submucous coat, where they present the appearance of numerous small white bodies or grains, scattered throughout the tunic, very nume- rous towards the pylorus, and gradually di- minishing in number, and ceasing altogether at the end of the duodenum. They pre- cisely resemble the elementary grains of a salivary gland, spread out on an expanded surface, instead of being collected into a mass. They commence abruptly, at the duodenal side of the pyloric valve, but cease gradually, becoming less and less numerous, as the duodenum advances. They vary a good deal, both in size and in numbers, in dif- ferent individuals ; and in a few cases 1 have had great difficulty in finding them, ow- ing to their being extremely small. Like other glands of the intestine, they seem to me to waste and almost entirely disappear in many old persons. These glands belong specially to the duodenum ; and the appro- priateness of the name duodenal is enhanced by the fact, that no other part of the intes- tine ever exhibits any structures like them. Such is the description of them in man. They are distinct, but occupy a small space, not more than an inch beyond the pylorus, in the cat, dog, and rabbit. In the horse they are larger than in any animal I have examined them in ; in him they form several layers surrounding the intestine, each layer containing grains of a different size, the larger ones being nearest the mucous mem- brane. The structure of these bodies is precisely the same as that of the elements of salivary glands, or the conglomerate gland of the older anatomists. Its ultimate secreting element consists of bunches of vesicles, as may be seen in fig. 4, which is a diagram to show their structure, as I have observed it under a high power, and their relation to the intestine. The vesicles C have ducts emerging from them, which, by coalescing, form large ones, and these pass thrpugh the submucous tissue, and open on the surface of the mucous membrane, between Lieber- kiihn’s follicles, or by becoming continuous with them. 2. The second class of intestinal glands have received the name “ solitary glands,” Fig. 4. Diagram of a magnified view of Brunner's glands. A, Lieberkiihn’s follicles. B, Ducts of the glands. C, Terminal vesicles of the glands. glandules solitaries. Several anatomists and physicians confound them most erroneously with Brunner’s glands ; from which, how- ever, they differ very materially in struc- ture, in position, in liability to disease. The solitary glands are scattered through- out the small intestine, and are most numerous below the duodenum ; they also exist in con- siderable numbers in the large intestine, especially in the caecum and vermiform ap- pendix. If you examine the caecum of the dog, you obtain an excellent example of them on a large scale. They are simple vesicular bodies, resembling in section a Dutch bottle, wicte at their blind extremity, and tapering to the surface of the mucous membrane, on which they open by a very fine orifice, not easily seen in the human subject, especially in the glands of the small intestine. Each gland is deposited in the midst of Lieberkiihn’s follicles, and there- fore appears surrounded by a zone of the orifices of these tubes. When filled with mucus, or any other material, they appear
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3