582 Chronic Interstitial Hepatitis. 



materials present in tlie intestine, wliicii are conveyed to tlie 

 liver by the portal blood and set up irritation, causing prolifera- 

 tion of the connective tissue. 



Krawkow was able to cause cirrhosis of the liver in experimental animals with 

 broth made from putrid horse tiesh. Boix had positive results with the sub- 

 cutaneous inoculations of monobasic fatty acids which tend to be formed by ab- 

 normal fermentative processes in the intestine. 



Disease viruses are probably common causes of chronic 

 hepatitis. Joest produced a condition resembling- the Schweins- 

 berg disease, both clinically and as regards the lesions by long 

 continued injections of the bacillus suisepticus. Pronounced 

 lesions of chronic hepatitis were observed by Eisenmann in sev- 

 eral cases of swine erysipelas, and similar lesions may be 

 sequels to infectious diseases (post-infectious chronic hepatitis). 



Langer found in calves' livers numerous necrotic foci often associated with 

 cellular infiltration, which closely resembled those seen in the human subject in 

 typhoid, cholera, scarlatina and measles. From these nodules a bacillus of the 

 typhoid type was cultivated (bacillus nodulifaeiens bovis), the cultures of which 

 produced similar nodules in the livers and kidneys of mice, guinea pigs and a calf. 



Dantschakowa produced chronic induration of the liver in rabbits by repeated 

 subcutaneous inoculations of the staphylococcus pyogenes aureus at intervals of 

 4 days in 7 to 15 weeks. This was followed by a localized small-celled infiltration 

 and the development of a collagenic tissue in the center of the lesions and peripheral 

 extension of the infiltration. 



Finally certain infectious diseases and poisons are capable 

 of setting up chronic cirrhosis of the liver. 



The disease is very frequenth^ seen as a secondary con- 

 dition. It is caused principally by animal parasites (fluke, Cysti- 

 cercus tenuicollis, and the larvaB of sclerostomes). The sheep 

 and pig are affected chiefly, but it is also met with in calves, 

 horses and ral)bits. As already mentioned, Schlegel and Adel- 

 mann look upon the Schweinsberg disease as a generalized 

 sclerostomiasis (see page 530). The formation of fibrous tissue 

 is due partly to the destruction of liver tissue and partly to 

 toxic materials elaborated by the parasites themselves, particu- 

 larly the fluke. 



Chronic hepatitis may be caused through chronic inflamma- 

 tion of the walls of the bile ducts arresting the flow of bile, and 

 by extension of the inflammatory process from the inter- and 

 intra-lobular bile ducts to the interstitial tissue, the amount of 

 connective tissue being increased. Engorgement with l)ile may 

 lead to impairment of the nutrition of the epithelium of the bile 

 ducts, and this may be followed by a bacterial invasion and so 

 cause a production of fi])rous tissue in the surrounding liver 

 tissue, or the tissue production may be due to the ill-effects of 

 the biliary engorgement on the liver cells themselves. 



Purulent foci and tuberculous lesions may cause not only 

 cirrhosis in their inmiediate neighborhood, l)ut a diffuse lesion 

 throughout the liver. 



Chronic venous congestion caused by certain diseases of the 



