Observations on functional affections of the spinal cord and ganglionic system of nerves, in which their identity with sympathetic, nervous, and imitative diseases is illustrated / by William Griffin and by Daniel Griffin.

Date:
1834
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on functional affections of the spinal cord and ganglionic system of nerves, in which their identity with sympathetic, nervous, and imitative diseases is illustrated / by William Griffin and by Daniel Griffin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    dorsal only, sometimes, and most frequently, of both*. The fact of the dependence of the pain on irritation or disease of some portion of the spine, which is itself of great practical importance, can, at all events, be sufficiently established. We shall first quote a case from the Glasgow Journal, to show the connection of cramp of the stomach with disease at the base of the brain. XXXIV. “ A lady, twenty-eight years of age, was af- fected, about twelve hours after her first confinement, with well-marked symptoms of spasm in the stomach, and that without any apparent cause. She had taken a little arrow- root, prepared with water, and had slept for several hours, when she was suddenly awakened by excruciating pain in the region of the stomach. She struck this part with her hand, pressed upon it with all her force, and complained of great difficulty of breathing. The pulse was small and rapid, the skin cold and moist, and the countenance of a deadly paleness. . Two draughts, containing full doses of laudanum, ether, and volatile tincture of valerian, were ex- hibited without effect; sinapisms, prepared with turpentine, were applied to the stomach and inferior extremities; and, about half an hour before death, when the powers of life were rapidly sinking, brandy was freely given. On dissec- tion, the only morbid appearance that could be discovered, by the most accurate investigation, was general softening of the cerebellum, with vascular turgescence in the base of the brainP The pain of stomach in this case was evidently sympto- matic, and, as it would appear, altogether the result of organic cerebral disease; but mere irritation of the same parts, we have reason to believe, may produce similar effects. The probability of the occurrence of cramp of stomach, after delivery, might in fact be always inferred, where there is great tenderness of the upper cervical, and * From the tables given at the close, one would be rather led to believe that the sickness of stomach depended on the cervical irrita- tion—the pain on the dorsal. In thirty cases of the former, there was pain of stomach in only two. In forty-six of the latter, it was present in thirty-four.