CHANGES DURING PREGNANCY 517 



biological reaction, and Freund l states that a precipitable substance 

 is present in the urine of pregnant women. Others have been unable 

 to find such a substance either in the blood or urine (see Weichardt 

 and Opitz 2 ). 



Veit's 3 theory is also sub judice. Taking up Schmoii's 4 discovery 

 that eraboli of placental cells may be found in organs of the mother 

 in eclampsia, he extends it to normal pregnancy, and postulates that 

 syncytial fragments and even whole villi pass regularly into the 

 maternal circulation. There they give rise to an anti-body, a 

 syncytiolysin, which itself dissolves the circulating syncytium. He 

 also seeks to explain, by the activity of the lysin, the absorption 

 of haemoglobin and other proteins from the intervillous space by the 

 villi, the pigmentation of the skin and vaginal mucous membrane 

 from superficial emboli, and the phenomena of telegony from the 

 circulation of elements derived in part from the paternal side. 5 



At present it is only a speculation, as Veit himself is careful to 

 explain, but its far-reaching possibilities have already given rise to 

 many investigations. It must be clearly understood, however, that 

 biologists have at present no convincing proof of the formation of 

 an anti-body consequent on the introduction of any protein of the 

 same individual, or one of the same species. 



Abderhalden 7 claimed to have obtained evidence of the formation 

 of specific ferments arising in the maternal organism as the result 

 of the formation of the placenta. These ferments, which he calls 

 " defensive ferments," were stated by him to have a specific action 

 on the proteins of the placenta, and their formation was regarded by 

 him to be the result of the reaction of the body against the presence 

 of substances foreign to the blood. He elaborated a technique 

 which renders it possible to recognise the presence of a placenta 

 by the presence of these ferments ; the so-called " Abderhalden 



1 Freund, " Beitrage zur Biologic der Schwangerschaft," Vortr. auf d. 

 76 Naturf. zu Breslav, 1904. 



2 Weichardt u. Opitz, u Zur Bioehemie der Schwangerschaft," Deut. med. 

 Woch., 1903. 



3 Veit, " Ueber Deportation von Chorionzotten," Zeitsck. f. Geb. u. Gyntik., 

 vol/ xliv. Also Veit u. Scholten, " Synzytiolyse und Hamolyse," Zeitscli. f. Geb. 

 u. Gyndk., vol. xlix., 1903. 



4 Schmorl, Path.-Anat. Untersuclmngen iiber die Puerperalekla/mpsia, Leipzig, 

 1893. 



5 The discussion of the relationship between the deportation of chorioniu 

 villi and the pathology of eclampsia, pregnancy kidney, placental polypi, 

 hyperemesis, etc., falls outside the scope of this work. A critical summary 

 of recent work on this subject is given in Medical Science, vol. v., 1921, p. 537, 

 in a review entitled " The Biochemistry of Eclampsia." 



6 See Kollmann, "Kreislauf der Plazenta, Chorionzotten und Telegonie," 

 Zeitsch. f. Biol., vol. xlii., 1901. Hinselmann, Die angebliche physiologische 

 Schwangerschaftsthrombose von Gefdssen der uterinen Plazentarstelle, Stuttgart 

 (F. Euke), 1913. 



7 Abderhalden, Abwehrfermente, Berlin, J. Springer, 1914, 4th Edition. 



