On infant feeding and the value of preparations of pure Alpine milk / by Dr. Nachtigal.

  • Nachtigal, Dr.
Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On infant feeding and the value of preparations of pure Alpine milk / by Dr. Nachtigal. 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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    known medically as 4 strumous,’ the assimilation of fat is the aim of the physician. This applies as much to defective bone-development in the stru- mous child as it does to the development of lowly tissue-growth in the lungs of the adult, otherwise tubercle, or phthisis pulmonalis. The introduction of cod-liver oil has been a boon to this large class of individuals. Why ? Because it is so easily assimilated. Not because there is any magic virtue in it. By its means many persons are enabled to take that fat requisite for healthy tissue-formation, who cannot digest other fats. The child which turns away with loathing from a piece of fat upon its plate will eagerly swallow the fishy oil. It is not a question of palate. This consideration will tell us of the importance of fat in the food. u How is fat digested ? Fat undergoes no change in the digestive act, except that of emulsi- fication, i.e. of division and sub-division, until the particles are minute enough to enter the lacteals. Cod-liver oil undergoes this process of emulsifica- tion more readily than any other fat; though some other fats are perhaps more desirable for tissue- building if they could be assimilated. Nature furnishes a fat-emulsion in milk for the nutrition of young animals; and this is much more palatable than the fish-oil. If other fats can be taken and digested, there is no advantage to be gained by resort to cod-liver oil, which frequently is not assimilated, but is voided yer anum unchanged and