Food in health and disease / by I. Burney Yeo ; with illustrations.

  • Yeo, I. Burney (Isaac Burney), 1835-1914.
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Food in health and disease / by I. Burney Yeo ; with illustrations. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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

    23/616 (page 11)
    Chap. I.] Metabolism. The physiological equilibrium is practically deter- mined by physicians by simply weighing their patients and observing that the body remains of the normal weight with a eiiven diet. When the'body is in this state of physiological equilibrium, about 90 per cent, of all the carbon taken in the food is excreted, in the form of carbonic acid, by the lungs and skin, and about 10 per cent, in the urinary excreta and ffeces. Almost all the nitrogen of the food is excreted in the form of urea within twenty-four hours. The hydrogen is eliminated chiefly in the form of water ; the oxygen chiefly in the form of carbonic acid and water. Owing to the oxidation of hydrogen, more water is eliminated than is taken in. The soluble salts are mostly discharged in the urine; the insoluble and less soluble ones (especially those of potash) in the fseces; some pass off in the perspiration. The sulphur which is contained in albumen is, in part, excreted in the form of urinary sulphates, and in part in the freces (Taurin), and a small proportion by the skin (epidermal scales).