Anaemia and some of the diseases of the blood-forming organs and ductless glands / by Byrom Bramwell.

  • Bramwell, Byrom, Sir, 1847-1931.
Date:
1899
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Anaemia and some of the diseases of the blood-forming organs and ductless glands / by Byrom Bramwell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    424/468 (page 412)
    The symptoms of myxedema are almost always developed in a slow insichous, and gradual manner - whereas the Symptom of exophthalmic goitre not unfrequently develop with 2£i ap.d.ty, sometimes, indeed, suddenly, after a fright oote1 found emotional disturbance. P Myxcedema is usually developed at a later age than exoph- halmic goitre. The ordinary adult form of myxedema is usuaHy developed between the ages of 35 and 45, rarely during adolescence ftr? on t '\ ^ ^ °f 15 and ^ E-Phthahmic goitre on the contrary, is most frequently developed between the ages of iS and 35-. very rarely after the age of 50. In my series of 34 cases of adult myxcedema, the average age at which the dis- ease developed in women was 41 years and in men 43 years- while in my series of 76 cases of exophthalmic goitre (in which the age of onset was noted) the average age at which the disease developed in the female cases was 30 years, and in the male cases 36 years Myxcedema is most frequent in married women who have borne children or have had large families ; while exophthalmic goitre is most common in unmarried (single) women, and (?) in married women who have not borne children or have had small families Pregnancy seems, as a rule, to exert a prejudicial influence on patients who are affected with myxcedema ; while, in some cases of exophthalmic goitre, it seems to prove beneficial or even curative. This is not, however, always the case ; in two of my cases at least pregnancy seemed to aggravate or to excite the development of the disease. In my series of 29 cases of adult myxcedema in females, 23 were married and 6 were single ; whereas in my 73 female cases of exophthalmic goitre, 49 were single (when the disease developed) and 24 married. The 23 married women affected with myxcedema had, on an average, 5.1 children each; while the 25 married women affected with exophthalmic goitre had, on an average, 3.2 children each.f In myxcedema, the temperature is subnormal, unusually stable, and the patients are extremely susceptible to cold ; whereas in exophthalmic goitre, temporary elevations of temperature, appa- * A few cases have been reported, and I have myself met with two instances, in which the symptoms of myxcedema were developed more or less rapidly, but in some of these cases the disease had probably been in existence for some time unknown to the patient. t This difference is probably in part at least (possibly altogether) accounted for by the difference in age ; the myxcedematous patients were older and had been married longer than the exophthalmic goitre patients.