2.1 AMOEBIASIS IN THE AFRICAN. Drs. T.G. Armstrong

South African Medical Journal
Suid..Afrikaanse Tydskrif VIr Geneeskunde
Vo!. 23, No. 26 Cape Town, 14 May 1949
AMOEBIASIS IN THE AFRICAN
A REPORT ON THE TREATMENT OF 600 CASES*
Weekly 2s
T. G. ARMSTRONG, M.D., M.R.C.P., R. ELSDON-DEW, M.B., CH.B. AND R. J. MAROT, M.B., CH.B.
King Edward VIII Hospital, Durban
Amoebic dysentery in the African male is a common
and serious disease. At the King Edward VIII Hospital
we have about 2,500 admissions a year for this complaint.
When it strikes the African, the disease is
.
• This paper was read at the South African Medical Congress
at Pretoria, July 1948.
much more severe than in Europeans or Indians. One
of us (R. E.-D. l ) reported in 1945 a mortality rate
of 10% which is due in the main either to perforation
or to collapse from an acute fulminating dysentery
with chloride deficiency and dehydration. The response
of the African to the usual anti-amoebic drugsemetine,
E.B.I. or diodoquin-is very poor when com-
Fig. 1. Microscopic appearance of the stools. This picture shows the enormous numbers of Entamoeba histolytica
found in the stools of Africans suffering from acute fulminating amoebic colitis.
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S.A. MEDICAL JOUR AL
Amoebiasis in the African: Drs. T. G. Armstrong. R. Elsdon-Dew and R. J. Marot
24 DAYS
Fig. 3. Progress in the sigmoidoscopic appearances of two cases of amoebic ulceration under treatment with
penicillin and sulphasuxidine only.
14 May 1949