A manual of the practice of medicine / by George Hilaro Barlow.

  • Barlow, George Hilaro, 1806-1866.
Date:
1861
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A manual of the practice of medicine / by George Hilaro Barlow. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    2^ COAGULATION OF BLOOD. force is in excess, depending proljably upon increased tonicity, the contiuued contraction, of the fibrine forming tlie bufly coat gives it the cupped appearance. An important practical inference may be drawn from tlie above statements, viz.,-that the buffy coat is not of itself a certain sign of any particular condition of the blood, since it may be produced by several different, and, in some respects, opposite causes. The proportion of dry albumen in healthy blood is about 70 or 80 per 1000 ; under some circumstances of disease, pro- bably m inflammatory fever, it maybe increased ; and the same may happen (proportionately to the fluid constituents of the blood) when a large quantity of water is carried rapidly out of the system, as m spasmodic cholera. This imnciple is reduced m quantity sometimes as low as 60 or 50 per 1000, or even lower, when a considerable amount is carried of^ by the urine in disease of the kidneys, or by repeated hajmon-hages, or other exhausting discharges. It is possible that it is also deficient in cases of imperfect digestion or sanguification. The proportion of oily or fatty matter, in the blood, has not been accurately ascertained, and it probably undergoes great variations m health, being generally the greatest about four or five hours after a fuU meal: its presence is indicated by an oily or milky appearance of the serum. The proportion of the salts of the blood is also liable to increase or diminution, and this variation, no doubt, plays an important part in many pathological phenomena. An excess of the salts retards, as we have already seen, the coagulation of the fibrine, and when very great, prevents it altogether. A decrease in the quantity of these substances tends, according to Henle, to favour the adhesion of the corpuscles to each other; and is stated by him to exist in infiammatory affections. The same deficiency is said by Stevens and others to be present in pesti- lential fevers and cholera. Independently of the variations in its natural ingredients, the blood may also undergo morbid alterations, from the presence of excretoiy or other matters which do not belong to it in health, or, if so, not in appreciable quantities. Now we know, from physiology, that there are various matters, the products of the interaction of the tissues and the blood, which are in health speedily eliminated; and we also learn, from observation of disease, that if these matters are not thus re- moved they remain in the blood, and act as poisons. The most important substances of this character, and those