Volume 1

A system of medicine / edited by J. Russell Reynolds.

Date:
1866-1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A system of medicine / edited by J. Russell Reynolds. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    213/976 (page 193)
    inflamed lung tissue. Pneumonia of this kind, however, is more often combined with other pyrnmic changes in the lung, than it is an uncomplicated phenomenon ; sometimes surrounding apoplectic and other patches, and it may be combining several of these into a common mass of consolidation; sometimes forming independent patches scat- . tered indiscriminately among them. Abscesses or collections of puri- form matter are common, but very far from universal; olten they aie formed, as has been described, by the breaking down ot clots, still more often they result from the purulent infiltration of pneumonic patches, and in both such cases are found in combination with patches of haemorrhage, or of inflammation, or ot both. Put there are some !. cases of Pyaemia where abscesses alone, sometimes surrounded by solid infiltrated parietes, sometimes by breaking-down tissue, are dis- r, covered. In these cases it would almost seem that the process is j different from the beginning ; that in some ot them the formation of j< pus takes place coinciclently with, if not prior to, whatever other in- flammatory changes may be found associated with it; that in others the diseased and puriform patches are the simple result of necrosial i disintegration or sloughing. The lung tissue in which the diseased patches are imbedded may he, and often is, healthy; but very frequently more or less of it is congested or cedematous or even carnified. The bronchial tubes S mostly present an excess of secretion, and those which are directly connected with the diseased tracts often contain pus, and sometimes the rusty tenacious fluid which characterises pneumonia. The sub-pleural tissue, especially that investing the lung, is generally the seat of extravasations of blood; and appears therefore studded more or less thickly and more or less irregularly with petechial spots and vibices. The surface of the pleura may be smooth and healthy-looking ; or it may be invested in its whole extent by a layer of recently effused lymph ; and the cavity may be occupied in a greater or less degree by transparent, opaline, or even distinctly purulent fluid. But, perhaps more commonly, the lung is only partially onvpiwl wifli 1 lnrrna rv-p i ei n ci i r» 1 \n 4-*r«