Report of the Scientific Committee appointed by the Royal Medical & Chirurgical Society to investigate the relations between membranous croup and diphtheria.

  • Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society of London.
Date:
1879
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of the Scientific Committee appointed by the Royal Medical & Chirurgical Society to investigate the relations between membranous croup and diphtheria. 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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    5 tigations into the morbid anatomy of the diseases in question have also been prepared, and are appended. A report upon the microscopic anatomy of all the cases which have been available is also added. Although the Committee feel that there is yet much to be investigated before any final conclusion can be reached as to the etiology of membranous exudation in the larynx and trachea, they believe that upon some, at least, of the various questions involved in the subject some light will be thrown by their labours. Object and Scope of the Inquiry. The object of the inquiry may be briefly defined as the determination of the disputed question, whether there is such a disease as “idiopathic membranous croup,” i.e. whether membranous laryngitis exists independently of the diph- theritic poison, and whether, if so, there are any criteria by which it can be distinguished clinically or pathologically. Two distinct branches of the inquiry are thus opened, viz. whether other causes than the process generated by the diphtheritic poison are capable of giving rise to membranous exudation in the larynx and trachea; and whether it is found in practice that such cases occur with sufficient definite- ness and frequency to rank as a separate disease. For it is clear that if it can be shown that other causes than the diphtheritic poison are capable of producing membranous exudation in that position, the solely diphtheritic origin of membranous laryngitis must be abandoned. Yet there would remain the questions whether the other causes were not so rare as to be inconsiderable, and whether the morbid product in the two cases was identical. It may be stated, in limine, that there is evidence before the Committee that membranous exudation in the air-passages can be produced by mechanical and chemical irritants apart from the contagious diphtheria; and that a few cases exist in which there is some evidence that membranous laryngitis has followed exposure to cold. It will, however, be seen