CHAPTER XI 

 PROTEIN SENSITIZATION OR ANAPHYLAXIS 



Introduction. The older medical literature occasionally 

 records facts which in the light of more recent and extended 

 knowledge are known as the phenomena of protein sensi- 

 tization. Such were some of the experiences recorded in 

 the early attempts at the transfusion of blood. Many of the 

 untoward results reached in this procedure and beyond 

 the ken of that time are now fully explained. Behring and 

 Kitashima 1 found on immunizing an animal to tetanus 

 toxin that it died in convulsions notwithstanding the fact 

 that the blood serum was richly charged with antitoxin. 

 They explained this by assuming the existence of a con- 

 dition of " hypersensitiveness" to the toxin. With our 

 present knowledge we see no reason for ascribing this to 

 the toxin. There is, so far as we know, no evidence that 

 animals can be rendered hypersensitive to either toxin or 

 antitoxin. Neither has ever been obtained free from pro- 

 teins, and since all true proteins, so far as we know, sensitize, 

 there seems no sufficient justification in ascribing a sensi- 

 tization induced by a protein solution containing a toxin 

 to the latter. Buchner 2 repeatedly injected bacterial pro- 

 teins into men and noticed that the cardinal indications 

 of local inflammation, tumor, rubor, dolor, and calor 

 resulted. Furthermore, he noted that fever increased with 

 repeated injections. Krehl and Matthes 3 induced fever in 

 animals by repeated injections of albumose and peptone. 

 Weichardt 4 made an advanced study in the domain which 



1 Berl. klin. Woch., 1901, No. 6. 



2 Berl. klin. Woch., 1890, 216; Munch, med. Woch., 1891, No. 3. 



3 Arch. f. exper. Path. u. Pharm., 1895, xxxv, 232; ibid., 1896, xxxvi, 437. 



4 Berl. klin. Woch., 1903, No. 1. 



