Volume 1

The Lettsomian lectures on dysentery : delivered before the Medical Society of London, 1914 / by F.M. Sandwith, M.D. Durh., F.R.C.P. Lond., Gresham Professor of physic; lecturer on tropical diseases, St. Thomas's Hospital.

  • Sandwith, Fleming Mant, 1853-1918
Date:
[1914]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Lettsomian lectures on dysentery : delivered before the Medical Society of London, 1914 / by F.M. Sandwith, M.D. Durh., F.R.C.P. Lond., Gresham Professor of physic; lecturer on tropical diseases, St. Thomas's Hospital. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Experimental Work. It is impossible to enter here into the details of experimental work which has led to the view out lined in this lecture. It has been frequently shown that injection of the pathogenic entamcebae into animals leads often to their infection and death from amoebic dysentery. Since the encysted stages of the entamcebae have been recognised, more accurate experiments have been conducted. From the work of Darling, James, Wenyon, Walker, and others it has been shown that, in cats espe¬ cially, the free forms of Entamoeba coli injected per rectum and the encysted forms given per os do not lead to any dysenteric symptoms, whereas the free Entamoeba dysenteriae injected per rectum or the encysted forms given per os lead to intense infection of the large intestine, invasion of the tissues, and the production of a condition of affairs exactly comparable to that of a human being suffer¬ ing from amoebic dysentery. In a series of investigations undertaken at the London School of Tropical Medicine Wenyon carried on the infection in cats for a series of passages. The initial infection was produced by injecting per rectum and per os the stool of a patient who had previously had amoebic dysentery, but had recovered. It was found, on routine examination, that there was a large infection of the “ minuta ” form and numbers of cysts were being passed. In fact, the patient was a “ convalescent carrier.” The first cat so treated acquired typical acute amoebic dysentery, and there were passed thousands of ent¬ amoeba} which were large and of the “ histolytica” type. No cysts, however, could be found. The gut contents of this cat, injected per rectum into a second cat, reproduced the condition of the first. A third cat was infected from the second and a fourth from the third. All the animals died of the disease and post mortem they all showed ulceration of the large intestine, which on section was found to be invaded by countless numbers of the large ent¬ amcebae. The entamcebae were also found in the mesenteric glands, while in the fourth cat there were found in addition four abscesses of the liver