On the thickness of the articular cartilages at different periods of life in the human subject / by P. Redfern.

  • Redfern, Peter, 1821-1912.
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the thickness of the articular cartilages at different periods of life in the human subject / by P. Redfern. 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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    tremities, which progressively diminishes in thickness during the whole of life, ancl which in old age sometimes appears to have been almost completely converted into bone.” Thus it would seem that the statement made in Mr Toynbee’s paper, has been the groundwork of Dr Carpenter’s explanation of whatever increase takes place in the length of a bone, after the union of its epiphysis with the shaft. Then, as Mr Quekett states1 that he found the articular lamellae of the head of the humerus of a female, aged nineteen, “ so very thin as only occasionally to be recognised,” whilst the same part in a woman of upwards of seventy years of age was u of great breadth.”2 The conclusion which the reader of these statements is very likely to draw is, that articular cartilages become thinner, whilst the articular lamellae thicken, these changes being probably proportionate to each other. Such a con- clusion has not been deliberate^ announced ; but if it be true that articular cartilages uniformly become thinner, and the articular lamellae as uniformly and gradually thicker, as life advances, it would be perfectly warrantable to go much farther than this, and to affirm that the diminishing thickness of one tissue, and the in- crease in the other, are owing to the conversion of one into the other, or to the replacement of one by the other,—i. e., to one or other of those actions which we know takes place in the ordinary formation of bone. But let us inquire whether articular cartilages uniformly and 'pro- gressively diminish in thickness as life advances or not. At the commencement of the inquiry, it must be observed that there are many occurrences which prevent the conclusions which may be drawn from measurements of the articular cartilages in dif- ferent bodies from being as absolute and as perfect as many others. Scarcely any tissue is more speedily changed in bulk by the ab- sorption of water into its substance, or by desiccation. The thick- ness of an articular cartilage can only be measured after a section has been carried through it and the bone which it covers; and the making of a large number of such sections and measurements is attended with a great expenditure of time and labour. Measure- ments must necessarily be taken considerably after the middle of life, and at that age it is difficult to meet with corresponding parts of large articular cartilages free from the changes which 1 have elsewhere3 described as a process of anormal nutrition, and which may, with great propriety, be styled senile degeneration of cartilage. 1 Histological Catalogue of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, vol. i. .Lend. I850j p. 130-131. 2 “ Nearly twice as broad ” are Mr Quelcett’s words, in his Lectures on Histology, London, 1852, p. 148, in a comparison of the thickness of the arti- cular lamellte of the head of the humerus of a female of upwards of seventy years of age with that of one of nineteen,—most likely referring to the same sections as are described in the Histological Catalogue. 3 Anormal Nutrition in the Human Ariicular Cartilages, with Experimental Researches on the Lower Animals. 8vo. Edinburgh, 1850.