A case of endemic haematuria from the Cape of Good Hope / by Arthur Davies.

  • Davies, Arthur Templer, 1858-1929.
Date:
[1885]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A case of endemic haematuria from the Cape of Good Hope / by Arthur Davies. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    6/8 (page 186)
    October 14.—Some difficulty in passing a clot this morning; still passing more blood in the day than at night; feels some- times as if something bad burst inside him, and be then passes nothing but pure blood; irritation in urethra less since taking turpentine ; passing less blood per rectum. Remarks.—It appears to be clearly established by Dr. John Harley,1 that this particular form of helminthiasis is found on the whole of the eastern littoral of the African continent, from the Nile Delta to the Cape of Good Hope, and that it is especially prevalent at Cairo and Uitenhage, which are equidistant from the Equator, and on opposite sides of it. The disease is absent from the West Coast, and from the interior plateau of South Africa. It is also found in the Mauritius, and in the Isle of France, in which latter place three-quarters of the children are attacked with it. As regards the mode of entrance of the parasite into the human body, Cobbold2 maintains that the medium of intro- duction is water taken into the system through the mouth, or else by means of water plants, such as watercress; and there is strong evidence in favour of this view, inasmuch as this disease is prevalent in districts where the rivers are sluggish, and their course obstructed by vegetation ; whereas inhabitants living on the banks of rivers which have rocky bottoms are free from the disease. Further, whilst the inhabitants of towns such as Durban, who driuk rain-water, are unaffected, coolies from Madras ami Bombay and European immigrants are especially prone to con- tract this disease, since they live on estates where sluggish streams flow through swampy valleys. I11 such a district lived the sub- ject of this memoir, and the fact that it was after a residence of three years that he contracted the disease (six months being the stated period) is probably due to the fact that he lived, not actually in the valley, but rather on the side of a range of moun- tains forming the watershed of the valley. It is a curious fact that whilst the immigrants from India suffer from this form of helminthiasis, the Kaffirs, who are also attacked by this disease, are yet more liable to another form of helminthiasis, namely, the common taenia of South Africa. Another mode of eutrance of the parasite into the human system is advanced by Drs. Knbidge and Lyle, both resideut at the Cape. They state that bathing is a cause of this form of parasitism, and that the animal gains entrance into the system either by the skin or by the urethra. They consider that the so-called Natal sores are produced in this way ; but this is scarcely probable. 1 Medico-Chirurgical Trans., vol. lvi. 1883. * British Medical Journal, 1S72.