Diet as a prophylactic agent against puerperal sepsis : with special reference to vitamin A as an anti-infective agent / by H.N. Green [and others].

Date:
[1931?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Diet as a prophylactic agent against puerperal sepsis : with special reference to vitamin A as an anti-infective agent / by H.N. Green [and others]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    broncho-pneumonia, pyelitis, and a septic condition of the genito-urinary tract. There is also reason to believe that the diet of many individuals in this country is deficient in vitamin A, the main sources of which are found in the more expensive foods—for example, milk, butter, eggs, and certain vegetables, while it is almost completely absent from cereals and cereal products and many other extensively eaten foods. A study of the prophylactic action of vitamin A against puerperal sepsis in women suggested itself as a promising method of testing the clinical significance of the animal experiments. The duty of the maternal organism during pregnancy is to supply all the substances necessary for the growth of the embryo. These substances she either gets directly from her food, synthesizes them from the ingested foodstuffs, or, when these sources are insufficient, she supplies them from her own body stores as long as they are available. Many substances cannot be synthesized by the body, and must therefore come directly from her food or from her depots replenished by food. Now the body has a great capacity for storing vitamin A, especially in the liver. This store has its origin in the vitamin A, and most probably also in the carotene, of the food eaten (Moore). If the diet is deficient in these factors, -as is probably the case in many individuals, the liver stores of vitamin A may be small, even at the beginning of preg¬ nancy. The demands of the growing foetus will make these reserves still smaller, for, in addition to the supplies necessary for actual growth and metabolism, the foetus demands a reserve of vitamin A for its own liver. (H. N. Green examined eight foetal livers and found that six of them contained vitamin A in varying quantities.) These facts indicate that many women at childbirth will be deprived of most of their reserves of vitamin A and, if the animal experiments have any meaning in terms of the human subject, they will have less resistance to the in¬ vasion of pathogenic organisms at the time of parturition. Apart from this evidence, however, there are other direct indications that women during pregnancy are specially liable to develop gross signs of vitamin A deficiency. Thus Birnbacher noticed that hemeralopia arising from lack of fat-soluble vitamins in the after-war years in Vienna was much more frequent during preg¬ nancy, particularly towards the end of term and in women bearing heavy children. Two other observations suggested the need for this investigation : 1. The infective foci found in animals following vitamin