A further contribution to the subject of vasomotor ataxia / by Solomon Solis Cohen.

  • Solis-Cohen, Solomon, 1857-1948.
Date:
[1902?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A further contribution to the subject of vasomotor ataxia / by Solomon Solis Cohen. 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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    different individuals. As a rule, if one hand be kept in ice-water for several minutes it will become red, while the other becomes more deeply blue. Warm water or hot water will redden the immersed hand without obviously affecting the other. Pressure, or stroking, quickly changes the color of the part manipulated to white, but the original coloration returns after a brief interval. Elevation of the hand will cause the color, whether pink, or blue, or purple, to disap- pear as the vessels become emptied, leaving the hand abnormally white. If the whitened hand then be allowed to fall it first becomes pink at the finger-tips, the pink tint spreading over the hand as the capillaries fill; and then, as the dilated veins begin to receive blood, the coloration will change through various shades to that formerly mani- fested—the same distribution of blue and pink as in the other hand being observed after some two or three minutes. If, however, the wrist be constricted by a broad ligature when the hand is allowed to- fall, the return of the coloration is delayed, or even prevented entirely while the bandage is in place. Even in those who fail to show marked color-changes, slight pressure with the finger-tips on almost any por- tion of the cutaneous surface will leave a white imprint with red borders persisting for several seconds. 6. In addition to the effect of weather upon the hands, referred to in the preceding paragraph, persons of deficient vasomotor co-ordina- tion usually exhibit marked general sensitiveness to changes of tem- perature. They may be divided, according to the nature of this temperature reaction, into several groups, of which three may he taken as types. In the first group may be placed those who suffer in summer, but are comparatively comfortable in winter. These will complain of the heat of an apartment whose temperature is pleasant to its other inmates. They sweat excessively on slight exertion, and usually exhibit Shakspeare's moist palm of youth, even when advanced in years. In such subjects, too, one is likely to find some degree of enlargement of the thyroid gland, and they are always made worse by the administration of thyroid extract. In the second group are those who complain in winter and are usually comfortable in summer. These persons ask for windows to be closed when others in the room prefer to have the windows open. They wish fires to be lighted earlier in the fall than is necessary for the comfort of other people; they usually burden themselves with excessive weight of cloth-