On the nature of the condition known as catalepsy / by J. Thompson Dickson.

  • Dickson, John Thompson, 1842?-1874.
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the nature of the condition known as catalepsy / by J. Thompson Dickson. 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.

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    . 'ij SUA-J, ... [From the B^isH'MEDiCAL'JOURNALj-^O^m^r 25th, 1869.] / -o‘ / lit* L S r\ sM, f * 'r.,i i 1; W / *£3 'N* . -. ON THE NATURJ^E THE CONDITION KNOWN AS CATALEPSY. By J. THOMPSON DICKSON, M.A., M.B. (Cantab.), M.R.C.P., _/ . Medical Superintendent of St. Luke’s Hospital. There is no doubt that catalepsy is one form of the manifold sub- jective phenomena which may be attendant upon an imperfectly nou- rished nervous system; but the vague notions which have floated in the minds of many regarding its absolute cause have induced me to seek for facts upon which some certain explanation or probable theory may be founded. The difficulty in such an inquiry necessarily is the rarity of death under such a condition, whereby a reasonable or probable theory might be ratified by observation of the morbid anatomy of the brain and spinal cord in the subjects of this form of nervous disorder. I am in- clined, however, to think that pathological observation would not assist us very materially; while we may draw some very certain conclusions from the comparison of the manifestation of this state with the expres- sions of allied nervous conditions. Dr. Watson, in his ever recent Lectures, has placed catalepsy and hysteria in the same category with neuralgia and tic douloureux; which latter forms of nervous disorder Trousseau placed under the head of epilepsy, and with good reason. Dr. Watson [Lectures on the Prin- ciples and Practice of Medicine, vol. i, p. 716) expresses his opinion, which is endorsed by Dr. Chambers, that the condition, in one case at least under their observation, of temporary loss of muscular power, without loss of consciousness, was dependent upon a diseased state of the blood-vessels of the brain. The late Professor Schroeder van der Kolk demonstrated beyond all question that in epilepsy the capillaries of the medulla oblongata be- come dilated—a fact which every one can observe, either upon the human subject, or upon animals the subjects of induced epilepsy. Trousseau advanced the idea that the condition of the brain in epilepsy was that of anaemia; which opinion was not only afterwards reduced to absolute demonstration by himself, but has been shown to be true by the beautiful experiments of Dr. Brown-Sequard.