Leucocytosis in plague and other infections ; and, A method employed in studying the interaction of bacilli and animal fluids 'in vitro' / by R. Row and N.F. Surveyor.

  • Row, R.
Date:
1902
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Leucocytosis in plague and other infections ; and, A method employed in studying the interaction of bacilli and animal fluids 'in vitro' / by R. Row and N.F. Surveyor. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    size one ordinarily takes for studying the malarial parasite^ or else the leucocytes get compressed between the slide and the cover-glass and their amoeboid movements become very sluggish. The leucocytes, as a rule, in healthy persons have been found to retain their motility for about twenty- four to forty-eight hours, while in one case the longest pe- riod noted was eighty hours. The ordinary finely granular Polymorphic forms genera,lly die at the end of twenty-four hours, while the Eosinophiles are the most resistant ones. This motility varies, considerably in disease. Thus observa- tions in septic conditions, which primarily affect the blood, have shown that the motility is generally abolished within three to six hours. On the other hand, in septic infection of the perito- neum, which, as it were, kills the patient too rapidly, no time is allowed for the leucoqytes to be much affected, and in such cases the leucocytic motility, although less than normal, is not so. rapidly destroyed ; in fact in some cases the leucocytes have been found to be slightly motile for about three to four hours after death of the patient, provided the slide be prepared soon after or- before death. On the other hand, in specific fevers like Enteric, Relapsing, Plague, etc., the motility varies more with the duration and severity of the case and also the vitality of the person than only with the rise of temperature. Thus, although the tem- perature be the same in two cases, one will show good amseboid motility, while in the other case motility may be quite abolished from the beginningor may be lost within a few hours. Thus in two cases of Enteric fever, although the temperature was 99’8° F. on a particular dayj the leucocytic motility continued for twenty-four hours in one case, while in the other it was scarcely seen. Both cases were of about the same age. The former case had just passed through the whole of the febrile coqrse, and the latter was in the middle of the attack. On the other hand, very good leucocytic motility has been observed in Plague and Relapsing fever at the commencement of the disease, even with yery high fever. Of course in sqch cases they