A modification of diphtheria antitoxin / by A.T. Glenny.

  • Glenny, A. T.
Date:
[1913?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A modification of diphtheria antitoxin / by A.T. Glenny. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    5/12 (page 63)
    A MODIFICATION OF DIPHTHERIA ANTITOXIN. Br A. T. GLENNY, B.Sc. (Preliminary Communication.) (From the Wellcome Physiological Research Laboratories, Brockwell Hall, Herne Hill, London.) One of the fundamental features of Ehrlich s method of standard¬ ising diphtheria antitoxic serum is the recognition of the so-called Lo and L-f limits, the L+ dose being the quantity of a toxin which when mixed with one unit of antitoxin and injected subcutaneously into a guinea-pig leaves sufficient excess of toxin free to cause the death of the animal about the fifth day after injection, the Lo dose being the largest quantity which when similarly mixed with one unit of antitoxin fails to produce a local reaction. In the region between the two doses, the so-called “Differential-Region” of Ehrlich, one can obtain a series of mixtures which, while they kill the guinea-pig later than the fifth day or not at all, cause local reactions of varying severity increasing as the L-f limit is reached. It should be noted that Ehrlich draws attention to the fact that the oedema produced by these intermediate mixtures is far less severe than that produced by doses of unmixed toxin, even when these are small fractions of the M. L. D., and that it practically never terminates in ex¬ tensive skin necrosis as does the reaction to toxin alone. In the standardisation of an ordinary specimen of diphtheria anti¬ toxic serum, when graduated doses are mixed with one test dose of toxin, the local and general effects obtained are of the type shown in Table I. For a given toxin the volume of any normal diphtheria antitoxic serum, necessary for complete neutralisation of one test dose, bears a fairly constant ratio to the volume of the same serum which, when