Tubercular leprosy in Madagascar / by Andrew Davidson.

  • Davidson, Andrew, 1836-1918.
Date:
1864
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Tubercular leprosy in Madagascar / by Andrew Davidson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    Leprosy, whicli in Europe and America had become well nigh an historical disease, is again beginning to show itself in various localities in the old and new worlds. This fact will justify-^ie in laying before the public a short account of the disease as I have observed it in the Island of Madao'ascar. The number of cases treated in the dispensary at Antananarivo during the year 1862 was nearly one hundred, and the following account of the disease is drawn up from the notes of the cases actually observed. For the sake of clearness of description, the progress of tubercular leprosy may be divided into three stages or periods,—the first, characterized by the appearance of spots; the second, by tubercles j and the third, by ulceration or falling off of the members. These three stages may co-exist simultaneously in different parts of the body: thus, leprous spots may be seen on the trunk, tubercles on the face, and ulceration may be going on at the extremities. Spots of changed skin, however, invariably precede the tubercles, and the latter are in turn succeeded by ulceration. Tubercular leprosy is singularly uniform in its symptoms, progress, and termination in different parts of the world, nor has it suffered any modification whatever since it was first described by Aretasus. Several varieties indeed have been described by authors, as Lepra ancesthesiaca, Lepra taurica, and some others; but these varieties are not founded upon any differences of importance, but upon the degree in which a common symptom is present, which really furnishes no sufficient ground for establishing them as distinct varieties. The disease usually begins so insidiously that the patient is unable to state the precise period of its commencement. Some authors have described it as beginning with the constitutional symptoms proper to fever or inflammation, as hot skin, full pulse, rigors, and muscular pains. Judging from the many cases which have come under my own observation, this must be a mistake. Fever may occur in a leprous