698 PHYSIOLOGY OF DIGESTION AND SECRETION. 



on proteids without this preliminary treatment. These and other 

 facts seem to indicate that the peptic digestion is not so much an end 

 in itself as a preparation for subsequent intestinal digestion. The 

 stomach, therefore, may be removed without a fatal result. Several 

 cases are on record in which the stomach was practically removed by 

 surgical operation, the esophagus being stitched to the duodenum.* 

 The animals did well and seemed perfectly normal, although special 

 precautions were necessary in the matter of feeding. 



Absorption in the Stomach. In the stomach it is possible that 

 there may be absorption of the following substances : Water; salts; 

 sugars and dextrins that may have been formed in salivary digestion 

 from starch, or that may have been eaten as such; the proteoses and 

 peptones formed in the peptic digestion of proteids or albuminoids. 

 In addition, absorption of soluble or liquid substances drugs, 

 alcohol, etc., that have been swallowed may occur. It was formerly 

 assumed, without definite proof, that the stomach absorbs easily 

 such things as water, salts, sugars, and peptones. Actual experi- 

 ments, however, made, under conditions as nearly normal as possible, 

 show, upon the whole, that absorption does not take place readily 

 in the stomach certainly nothing like so easily as in the intestine. 

 The methods made use of in these experiments have varied, but the 

 most interesting results have been obtained by establishing a fistula 

 of the duodenum just beyond the pylorus. f After establishing this 

 fistula food may be given to the animal and the contents of the 

 stomach as they pass out through the pyloric opening may be 

 caught and examined. 



Water. Experiments of the character just described show that 

 water when taken alone is practically not absorbed at all in the 

 stomach. Von Mering's experiments especially show that as soon 

 as water is introduced into the stomach it begins to pass into the 

 intestine, being forced out in a series of spurts by the contractions of 

 the stomach. Within a comparatively short time practically all 

 the water can be recovered in this way, none or very little having 

 been absorbed in the stomach'. For example, in a large dog with a 

 fistula in the duodenum, 500 c.c. of water were given through the 

 mouth. Within twenty-five minutes 495 c.c. had been forced out of 

 the stomach through the duodenal fistula. This result is not 

 true for all liquids; alcohol, for example, is absorbed readily. 



Salts. The absorption of salts from the stomach has not been 

 investigated thoroughly. According to Brandl, sodium iodid is 

 absorbed very slowly or not at all in dilute solutions. Not until its 



* Ludwig and Ogata, " Archiv f . Physiologie, " 1883, p. 89 ; Carvallo 

 and Pachon, "Archives de physiologic norm, et path.," 1894, p. 106. 



} von Mering, " Verhandl. des Congresses f . innere Med., " 

 12. 471. 1893; Edkins, "Journal of Physiology/' 13, 445, 1892; Brandl, 



f Compare von Mering, 

 _, 471, 1893; Edkins, "J^^. w , 

 Zeitschrift f. Biologic," 29, 277, 1892. 



