The Science of Therapeutics - Classical Homeopathy Online

Full text of "The Science of Therapeutics: According to the Principles of Homeopath...Page 260 of 653are transformed into a tough, brown-green, humid, horriblying scurf which is sharply circumscribed and surrounded by oedematous tissue. The sphacelated portion of lung which is at firsttolerably firm, soon dissolves into an ichorous fluid. It occursfrequently at the periphery of the lungs and in the lower lobes.a bronchial trunk opens into the gangrened portion of lung, theichor often runs into the former, causing an intense bronchitis.Gangreneud scurfs may likewise form on the pleura. After softening, ihe-gmBgreoovLB ichor runs into the pleural cavity, causingsevere pleuritis; if the gangrened portion of lung communicateswith a bronchus, pyopneumo-thorax may result, and, if the vesselsbecome corroded, hemorrhage from the lungs may take place. If804 Diseases of the Lungs.interstitial pneumonia develops itself round the gangrened scurf,the latter is enclosed in a capsule as it were, and a cicatrix isformed ; this termination is exceedingly rare.Diffuse gangrene frequently affects whole lobes of the lungs; theparenchyma forms a decaying, blackish, fetid tissue, which issoaked with a blackish-gray, horridly-smelling ichor. The processis not circumscribed, but extends to the surrounding, cedematoushepatized parenchyma. If the gangrene invades the pleura, thisorgan becomes. involved in the process of destruction. The patiensuccumb to constitutional prostration.Metastatic abscesses and embolia in the different organs are notunfrequently the consequences of gangrene.Etiology. Diffuse pulmonary gangrene sets in, although rarely,at the height of pneumonia, if all renewal of the blood and thenutrient process have entirely ceased in the inflamed lungs; pneumonias arising from the clogging up of the air-tubes in consequenof the intrusion of particles of food, are very apt, owing to theputrefaction of these molecules of animal matter, to terminate ingangrene.Circumscribed gangrene of the lungs may be occasioned by sanguineous clots compressing the bronchial arteries; the putrid contents of bronchiectatic caverns may give rise to putrid decomposition of the pulmonary parenchyma.Diffuse gangrene of the lungs in the case of drunkards or of individuals whose constitutions are broken down by misery and starvation; the occurrence of pneumonia in the case of insane persons,without any foreign bodies having become lodged in the bronchia ;and gangrene of the lungs setting in in the course of severe asthfevers like typhus, measles, smallpox, puerperal fever, etc., areficult to account for.Sf/mptoms. A characteristic symptom of gangrene of thelungs are the cadaverous, blackish-gray, liquid sputa, and thecadaverous odor of the breath which, in some cases, precedes thesputa for a few days. The stench is often so horrid that neitherthe patient nor his attendants can bear it. The sputa, like the fexpectoration from bronchiectatic caverns, separate into threehttp://www.archive.org/stream/sciencetherapeu00kafkgoog/sciencetherapeu00kafkgoog_djvu.txt