On some forms of paralysis from peripheral neuritis : of gouty, alcoholic, diphtheritic, and other origin / by Thomas Buzzard.

Date:
1886
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On some forms of paralysis from peripheral neuritis : of gouty, alcoholic, diphtheritic, and other origin / by Thomas Buzzard. 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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    several, some of wliicli are referred to in my book. The cases that I am about to quote in brief abstract are the most typical that I have seen, and the most useful, therefore, for illus- trating the subject. W. H—, a working man, aged forty-four, of previous good health, was brought to me at the hospital in January, 1873, in the following condition. He had double facial paralysis, total absence of power of voluntary contraction in the muscles of either leg, the grasp of both hands almost entirely lost, and partial paralysis of respiration and deglutition. There was incomplete paralysis of the right external rectus muscle and of the soft palate, especially on the left side. There was but little movement of the diaphragm, and the intercostal muscles were likewise acting so imperfectly that the patient could not lie down in bed. His sterno-mastoid and trapezii muscles acted freely. Cutaneous anaesthesia was more or less general throughout the trunk, extremities, and face—the tips of the fingers being especially numbed. The plantar reflex was absent in each foot. There was slight power of voluntarily contracting the muscles on the front of each thigh, but he was unable to contract in the least those on the front of either leg below the knee. A sense of numb- ness and weight was complained of in each leg, and occa- sionally a “throbbing ran down the left thigh and calf.” For the first two or three weeks also he had suffered from “ plus and needles ” in his legs. But at no time appa- rently had there been any actual pains in his extremities or involuntary muscular contraction. The power of the sphincter ani was normal, that of the bladder impaired to a slight extent. The muscles about the mouth showed