Practical observations on nervous and sympathetic palpitation of the heart, as well as on palpitation the result of organic disease / by John Calthrop Williams.

  • Williams, John Calthrop, 1801-1856.
Date:
1852
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Practical observations on nervous and sympathetic palpitation of the heart, as well as on palpitation the result of organic disease / by John Calthrop Williams. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    some persons, again, the lungs cover the heart more than usual, and the impulse is feeble until full expiration be made, when it is felt to be as strong, or even stronger, than usual. Increase of the area over which the impulse is felt, occurs much more frequently than diminu- tion ; all violent muscular actions increase the heart's impulse. The same effect is produced by all active mental emotions, by various changes in the blood—points which will be treated more fully when we come to speak of palpitation. In persons of nervous temperaments, in thin persons with narrow chests, and in children, the heart's shock may be sometimes felt, extending over a much wider range of surface than is natural— along the whole length of the sternum, under the left clavicle, and often, though less sensibly, under the right clavicle. The reason why we detect the pulsation of a child's heart over a larger extent of surface, must be sought in the conformation of the chest at an early period of life. It is then more con- tracted, and its walls are much thinner; hence the latter necessarily come in closer proximity with an extended surface of the central organ, and inversely, the same effect is produced, as would c 2