On growth, or, Health and diseases of youth / by A.M. Bureaud-Riofrey.

Date:
1845
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On growth, or, Health and diseases of youth / by A.M. Bureaud-Riofrey. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    or less mistaken, for alloflhem, were depending on the state of the spinal chord contained in the ver- tebral column. I had the curiosity to examine what was the state of menstruation in these 73 girls. And I found that, 60 out of the 73 had different disorders or irregula- rities of menstruation. In some, the menses had not appeared, in some others they were suppressed, in few they were pro- fuse, in the greatest part they were irregular, diffi- cult. So that amenorrhea which is absence or sup- pression of menses, and dysmenorrhea that signifies irregularity and suppression are the most common symptoms of diseases of the spine. But why in 148 cases, are there 73 cases belong- ing to girls? Because girls are growing, because in many of them the growth of the body was not completed, and as it is perfectly well known that from ten to twenty is the time in which the spinal column elongates, it is in that time that diseases of the spinal chord are naturally more common. It is a general rule of nature, and observation proves it, that an organ is liable to be diseased in pro- portion to the part of activity it takes in life, not that the normal function produces disease, but be- cause, generally speaking, there is some irregularity in the function, irregularity that comes from men- struation. In youth the spinal column of young la- dies, is more often diseased, because young ladies
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