On the anatomy of pneumonia / by William Henderson.

  • Henderson, William.
Date:
[1841]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the anatomy of pneumonia / by William Henderson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    8/14 (page 10)
    Stokes, too, coincides with the view of Andral. His words are, —44 We must agree with Andral in the opinion that the solidity of acute pneumonia arises not from any deposition of lymph, but merely from an excessive congestion of blood.” 1 * Dr Williams’ opinion differs from both of those which I have mentioned, 44 Many minute examinations,” says he, “ which we have made of hepatised lungs, have convinced us that the granulations con¬ tain no viscid mucus.” “ They appear rather to consist simp¬ ly of the little bunches of vesicles, whose membraneous tunics have been so swelled by the deposition of a soft albuminous mat¬ ter in them (the tunics,) as well as from the increased size of their blood vessels, that their cavities are obliterated.” 3 And, again, 44 this change consists in the gradual effusion of a semi¬ solid albumen in the interstitial tissues, which, pressing on and obliterating the cavities of air cells and smaller bronchi, destroys the spongy texture of the lung, and converts it into a more or less solid mass.” 11 Professor Kokitanski of Vienna, in his excel¬ lent work on pathological anatomy, now in process of publication, has reverted to the original opinion of Andral, which he re-as- serts in much the same terms as those which I have quoted from the Clinique Medicale. By the same methods of investigation as those which I have already mentioned, I have followed the successive changes of the more advanced conditions of the disease, and with so much faci¬ lity and exactness, as to admit of my giving the following parti¬ culars of the pulmonary granulations. When one or two of the red granulations are cut out, and bruised on a plate of glass, they are found to yield a thickish fluid. When this is submitted to examination by the microscope, it is found to contain, along with some blood-discs and small granules, numerous globular bodies, of a considerably larger size than blood-discs or pus globules. They correspond exactly with the description and figures which Vogel gives of the cells of the epithelium thrown off from an in¬ flamed mucous surface, and with the globules which abound in the expectoration of recent acute catarrhs, and in old catarrhal expectoration which is not of a yellow colour. Their presence in the secretion of the air-cells in the granulations of pneumonia, proves that the epithelium extends into these minute recesses, and the alterations which they undergo, corresponding as they do with those which inflammation effects in the epithelium of the bronchial tubes, prove the existence of inflammation in the tissue from which they are detached. In reference to these alterations, Vogel remarks, 44 If the mucous membrane become inflamed, the 1 A Treatise on the Diagnosis and Treatment of Diseases of the Chest, part i, p. 312. a Cyclop, of Practical Med., t. iii, p. 410. 3 Loc. cit. 4 On Diseases of the Chest, (1840,) p. 134.