Contribution to the etiology of rickets / by John H. Morgan.

  • Morgan, John H. (John Hammond)
Date:
[1882]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Contribution to the etiology of rickets / by John H. Morgan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    than others, one sees many cases of rickets which cannot be ascribed to the effect of such a diet. For instance, I have lately had under my care a male child, aged two years, who was one of twin boys, equally healthy at birth. One child was nursed by the mother entirely till nine months old, and he is perfectly healthy and strong; the other was brought to me on account of very pronounced rickets. This child had been brought up entirely by hand, and had been fed for the first year entirely on cow’s milk. The only other subject into which I made inquiry was as to the extent and character of the deformity of the various bones which were affected. Enlargement of the epiphyses of the ribs was found to be almost constant, while those of the radii and tibiae were affected with about equal frequency. Curvature of the tibiae was most frequently outwards; anterior and antero-external curvature Were met with in about an equal proportion of cases. Some deformities were curious and unusual, but the fact was established that in all cases they were symmetrical. This fact seems to point to the idea that all these deformities are due to a vitiated growth at the epiphysial line; and the theory that the weight of the body acting on the softened bones causes them to bend does not commend itself to argu¬ ment. If that were the case, since a child always begins by crawling, the femora would invariably be curved, whereas they are found to be so in a very small proportion of cases ; and since a child uses one leg for propulsion and the other for support, they could not be symmetrically deformed. This subject has been so recently before your readers that I forbear commenting at greater length on the results above given; but the views of Dr. Baxter have been so generally approved, that I am anxious to add, in the briefest possible way, the results of my own investigations, which so curiously coincide with his in their results. Pardon and Sons, Printers, Paternoster Bow, London.