Syphilis and the nervous system : being a revised reprint of the Lettsomian lectures for 1890 delivered before the Medical Society of London / by W.R. Gowers.

  • Gowers, W. R. (William Richard), 1845-1915.
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Syphilis and the nervous system : being a revised reprint of the Lettsomian lectures for 1890 delivered before the Medical Society of London / by W.R. Gowers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    course of iodide of potassium, the thickening is less and the opacity greater, so that the condition re- sembles more closely ordinary atheroma, for which it may usually be mistaken. I have seen such dis- ease in one arter}^ associated with recent and character- istic changes in another. I would ask you to note, also, in passing, the remarkable correspondence in seat between this arterial disease and ordinary atheroma. Except in the arteries of the brain and in the aorta, syphilitic disease is scarcely known. We ascribe the proclivity of those arteries to atheroma to the influ- ence of strain; is this also the cause that determines their affection in syphilis ? I can think of no other, but the fact must be borne in mind in connection with certain theories of the origin of the lesions. Many facts regarding this arterial disease will have to be considered when we come to the diagnostic problems they furnish, but certain of its pathological consequences must not be passed over. The first is the necrotic softening that follows occlusion of the diseased arter}^, or more often that of a branch coming off from the diseased spot. It is by this necrotic softening that the disease most frequently causes symptoms. Occlusion, however, does not always lead to softening. Induration may result, especially in the cortex, and more often in children than in adults. It is no doubt due to the arterial anas- tomoses being sufficient to prevent actual necrosis, although insufficient to maintain the integrity of the tissue. A second effect is the production of aneurism of the