The physiology of digestion : a review of the Leçons de physiologie experimentale appliquée a la médecine faites au College de France, par M. Claude Bernard = Lectures on experimental physiology as applied to medicine, delivered at the College of France by M. Claude Bernard.

  • Gilchrist, William.
Date:
[1859]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The physiology of digestion : a review of the Leçons de physiologie experimentale appliquée a la médecine faites au College de France, par M. Claude Bernard = Lectures on experimental physiology as applied to medicine, delivered at the College of France by M. Claude Bernard. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    1st, In regard to the digestion of fat. Bernard holds that this is the principal and most important function of the pancreas. Although lie is not entitled to priority in making the observation, he has done much to establish the facts upon which the theory is based. The grounds he advances for his belief are—1st, Fatty matters injected into the stomach are emulsionised and absorbed only at the point of junction of the pancreatic ducts with the intestine; and, as compa- I'ative anatomy shows that this point varies in situation, the experi- ment is, as it were, made for us by nature, (p. 254). 2nd, When pancreatic fluid is mixed with fluid fat or oil, an emulsion is instantly produced, which is persistent. This experiment may be performed equally well with olive oU, fresh butter, mutton suet, pork fat, or any other fatty body. On examining the change which had occurred, Bernard determined, by chemical means, that the fat is decomposed into glycerine and a fatty acid. This result is most apparent with butter, the acid of which (butyric) is easily recognised by its charac- teristic odour. No other liquid produces such a reaction with fat; in proof of which assertion, Bernard has examined bile, saliva, gastric juice, senmi of the blood, cerebro-spinal fluid, and semen; in none of these was the emulsion persistent. The power of forming an emul- sion with fat, would appear to be proportionate to the amount of organic matter in the pancreatic juice (p. 262). 3rd, When the two pancreatic ducts of a dog are tied, Bernard remarked (p. 270), that the fat remained unaltered in the small intestine, and that the lacteals contained a chyle very opaline and poor in fatty matters. 4:th, When the pancreas is destroyed by injecting into its duets liquefied fat, mercury or other substances, the animal, four or five days after the operation, eats vrith extreme voracity; and if fatty matters are given to it, these are found in great abundance in its excrements. Emaciation gradually occurs, and the animal at last dies in a state of complete marasmus, presenting to the last an extreme voracity, and fatty excrements. It might be objected to these experi- ments, that fat was given so abundantly that it escaped digestion; but, to refute such an argument, Bernard fed two dogs with a similar amount of fat, and in one of them obliterated the pancreas by injec- tion of its ducts. A comparative examination of the excrements, revealed, in the dog which was operated on, an abundance of fat, whilst in the other the foeces were quite natural (p. 290). We think these experiments would have been much more satisfactory had Ber- nard made careful calculations of the amount of fat given, and of the amount found in the excrements. Bernard foUows up these experi- mental proofs by the narration of cases of disease of the pancreas, being accompanied symptomatically with the presence of fat in the stools.. One would imagine that the truth of a theory, apparently so strongly supported by experimental and other evidence, could scarcely be floubted; but like all other scientific doctrines, it has had an appa- rently overwhelming ho.st of objections brought against it. In reply