On epilepsy in its relation to ear-disease : a dissertation for the degree of M.D. / by J.A. Ormerod.

  • Ormerod, J. A., 1848-1925.
Date:
1883
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On epilepsy in its relation to ear-disease : a dissertation for the degree of M.D. / by J.A. Ormerod. 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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    importance. Although most writers on epilepsy do not allude to it, there seems to he a certain a priori probability of such a relation. “Excentric” causes of epilepsy are generally admitted to exist; and it is not unnatural to place ear-disease among them, considering on the one hand the nervous phe- nomena (such as we have already discussed) which may be produced by the irritation, even of non-suppurative ear-disease, and on the other the fact that such gross diseases as cerebral abscess and meningitis may result from a neglected otorrhoea. Limiting the discussion to the subject of suppurative ear- disease, I shall quote what Dr. Hughlings-Jackson says on this subject: 1 “ Epilepsy, or epileptiform seizures, occasionally occur with ear-disease. Admitting a relation, the accepted explanation would be, that the ear-disease provokes the seizures by reflected irritation. The author suggested another hypo- thesis, the possibility that the aural disease led to disease in Hitzig’s and Ferrier’s region ; for in some cases, the aural disease was associated with epileptiform convulsions, starting in the hand, face, or foot of the opposite side. In one such case, the author had found a large tubercular or scrofulous tumour of the hemisphere on the side of the ear-disease, and on the side opposite the convulsions. He thought it possible that the disease is sometimes local softening from venous thrombosis, the convulsions depending on instability of grey matter around the part softened. H e had no direct evidence of this, but he thought he had some indirect evidence of it. He related 2 a case in which a man who had phosphorous necrosis of the jaw had, during an acute illness, frequent epileptiform convulsions affecting the left side of his face, both sides of the thorax, and slightly the left arm. In the intervals of the attacks there was paralysis of the face almost as complete as in ordinary Bell’s paralysis. At the necropsy there was, although not ear- disease, yet an equivalent state of things, there being pus in the right lateral sinus, and from this a vein with creamy contents was traced to the part most diseased of the right side of the brain ; about the anterior end of the Sylvian fissure 1 “On Nervous Symptoms with Ear-disease.” ‘British Medical Journal,’ March 24, 1877. 2 This case is recorded: ‘Medical Times and Gazette,’ January 6, 1872. In the first line of the report of the autopsy, for “ left ” read “ right.”