OF THE ALIMENTARY TRACT 151 



Here it must be kept in mind that, in case para- 

 sitism exists, diarrhoea would bring the organism 

 in activity and numbers not ever seen in the natural 

 stool. It must, also, be recalled that an intestinal 

 state in which there is inflammatory exudation, with 

 liquid content throughout its course, would furnish 

 most excellent opportunity for multiplication of the 

 organism and it would naturally tend to appear in the 

 liquid stool in unusual numbers. It would furnish 

 excellent conditions for cultivation. The adminis- 

 tration of a purgative may bring out tremendous 

 numbers when they may be scant or unobserved in 

 the natural stool. 



The common vague clinical state, in which there is 

 nervous debihty, deficient appetite, "indigestion," 

 with occasional attacks of diarrhoea in a chronic state 

 of constipation, flatulence and gaseous eructations, 

 abdominal discomfort of indefinite kind, and various 

 systemic dysfunctions, which is at times laid at the 

 door of Trichomonas hominis, is such a common state, 

 regardless of Trichomonas, that it cannot be said at 

 the present whether it may be ever due to this para- 

 site. 



The writer (1928) found that it had no particular 

 relation to any age period, 53% of Trichomonas hosts 

 being below 40 years of age and 78% below 50, while 

 of the flagellate-free 53% were below 40 and 83% 

 below 50. Children and the aged were found in- 

 fected. , 



Nineteen per cent, of the flagellate-free group of 



