Neurosyphilis : $b Modern systematic diagnosis and treatment presented in one hundred and thirty-seven case historiesSouthard, Elmer Ernest
Science
Neurosyphilis : $b Modern systematic diagnosis and treatment presented in one hundred and thirty-seven case histories
Southard, Elmer Ernest
Neurosyphilis
2. What was the cause of the hemitremor? The hemitremor suggested an
irritative or destructive lesion in the motor path. Delving into
the history it was learned that the patient had had a shock
followed by a right hemiparesis. This had cleared up leaving the
tremor as a residuum. The autopsy disclosed a reddish-brown
pigmentation and fibrous thickening of the pia over the left motor
area, confirming the idea of a previous hemorrhage. As a rule the
shock phenomena occurring in paresis clear up more completely and
no gross lesion is visible post mortem. However, cerebral
hemorrhage must be expected in any person suffering from syphilis,
and is no rarity in paretic neurosyphilis.
=PARETIC NEUROSYPHILIS (“general paresis”) with NORMALLY REACTING
PUPILS. History of trauma. Autopsy.=
=Case 51.= Daniel Wheelwright, a barber of English extraction, 57 years
of age, had had a sunstroke at 15. At 42, there had been pneumonia,
after which an attack of rheumatism was said to have kept the patient
from work for a year. There was trauma of head (falling wrench) at 44.
This blow on the head was the assigned cause of the mental disease,
symptoms of which, however, did not develop until about the first of
September, 1905, about three months before entrance, January 9, 1906,
and about six months before death, March 20, 1906.
It seems that the patient had begun to change in manner; he had become
despondent and apathetic, silent, and somnolent. Two weeks later, he
stopped working, began to read the papers once more, and became somewhat
more cheerful.
About Thanksgiving, Wheelwright got up at midnight, and remained up,
lighting all the fires and talking continuously. During the next two
weeks, he talked much to himself, laughing out at times. About two weeks
before Christmas he went out and started to make a sidewalk of old
boards, working in his shirtsleeves, without a hat. He would work until
midnight making screens for windows. During the day, he would go out and
give money to passing children; would offer to pay the grocer twice as
much as articles were worth.
On the day before Christmas, he put out all the fires and lights in the
house, sent all the family to bed, and opened all the doors. Christmas
morning, he rose early and got the washtubs ready. He helped his
compliant wife to do the washing, then put out all the fires and opened
the windows. After Christmas, he began to tell how rich he was going to
be through starting a garden and by making butter. He bought six or
seven quarts of milk daily, and procured carrots and oranges, grinding
them up to color the milk. January 9th he was committed to Danvers
Hospital.
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