Series of clinical cases (with observations) illustrating the views recently put forward by Dr. Brown-Séquard, as regards certain points connected with the physiology of the nervous system / by John W. Ogle, M.D.

  • Ogle, John W. (John William), 1824-1905.
Date:
[©1859?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Series of clinical cases (with observations) illustrating the views recently put forward by Dr. Brown-Séquard, as regards certain points connected with the physiology of the nervous system / by John W. Ogle, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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

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    to the healthy functions of certain parts of the nervous centres, would have been elicited by the study of cases of surgical injuries of those textures, or of such rapid diseases of the spinal or cranial bones as affect those subjacent nervous textures in a secondary manner as by pressure. This latter bind of cases is particularly serviceable in the study of the physiology and properties of the nervous centres, inasmuch as we have therein a probability of a quicker fatality, and in consequence less chance of such extensive structural changes taking place as would go far to com- pbcate and obscure the phenomena chiefly regarded; whether such textural alterations be indeed pathological, having occurred before death, or are essentially of post-mortem origin, and attributable in the main to chemical decomposition, which will be the more complete in proportion to ante-mortem pathological disintegration. In drawing to a close the above enumeration of omissions noticeable in many recorded cases of injury and disease, bearing upou the inva- luable propositions advanced of late years in the field of our studies of the nervous system, I am anxious emphatically to repeat, that many of the shortcomings of observation which I have commented upon are such as were in past years quite inevitable by reason of the uninformed state of our pathology and physiology, as regards multifarious points connected with the nervous system. Not a few of them have been the natural consequence of the absence of any pervading and regulating theory, in support and under the influence of which, observation should have been conducted. Convincing, but yet fully capable of more extended proof, especially by means of clinical cases sedulously and minutely observed, as are the demonstrations of Dr. Brown-S6quai*d in regard to the interesting physiological questions, of which the foregoing cases are illustrative, it is to me a subject of r'egret that these cases whjeh I have just cited are so scanty in number. I was anxious, and thought I should be able in 3ome way to show why so large a mass of material as that at my disposal has, comparatively speaking, yielded so little product, and that was my reason for bringing forward the various points of omission to which I have alluded, as occurring to one's mind in supervising clinical records in various quarters. I also felt assured that in our future investigations connected with disease and injury of the nervous system, greater care and precision of observation will be called for than hitherto we have been in the habit of bestowing in the matter. For this reason, therefore, having the hope and expectation that from their consideration a few practical suggestions may occur to the reader's mind for future use and guidance in the prosecution of re- searches connected with the multiform and too often embarrassing lesions of the nervous system, I have taken this opportunity of noticing such defects in our methods of examination as rise into prominence on reflection upon the ends which in such examination we must ever keep in view.