PARTURIENT LA MINI T IS. 689 



est noise, foaming at the mouth, and sometimes tossing the head and 

 bellowing. The pulse is hard and quick, but the heart's action is weak. 



Cause. 



Rolls thought that in the case he describes, depriving the animal of 

 its calf was the cause of the attack; Harms ascribes the symptoms to 

 chills, which cause brain congestion ; while Storrar looks upon the 

 malady as epileptic, dyspeptic, and uterine. " The animal affected has 

 calved some few days previously — say from four to fourteen, or even more 

 days ; she has been heartily eating her food ; giving milk very largely, 

 or, more correctly, her milk has been remarkably rich, and throwing up, 

 when left for a time, a very heavy layer of cream ; and the usual uterine 

 lochial discharge has been suppressed. Or the case might be thus 

 stated : An excessive drain upon the system by the mammary glands, 

 causing, perhaps, the suppression of the uterine cleansing, with the pecu- 

 liar smell about the animal, and more marked in her milk, which is 

 referred to by Mr. Rolls, followed by a more or less severely developed 

 attack of indigestion. These causes act upon the nervous centres, so as 

 to produce the extraordinary excitement which has been described. The 

 dyspeptic signs are the more prominently shown — such as a desire to eat 

 any .thing unclean in preference to good food, or coarse straw in prefer- 

 ence to roots or hay. The bowels becoftie torpid, and the supply of 

 milk nearly ceases." 



We can scarcely bring ourselves to believe that this condition is due to 

 psychical influences, and are rather inclined to attribute it to cerebral ir- 

 ritation from some physical cause — either indigestion, constipation, or 

 deranged circulation in the brain, and connected with the parturient 

 state. 



Treatment. 



If indigestion or constipation are present, purgatives should be admin- 

 istered, with stimulant or tonic medicines, according to the indications. 

 When there is much fury or excitement, narcotics in large doses may be 

 given — the best, perhaps, being choral hydrate. Great attention must be 

 paid to the diet. Giinther abstracted blood in large quantity, and gave 

 extract of stramonium. He, also, on the supposition that the brain was 

 congested, applied strong stimulants to the back of the head and to the 

 spine. 



CHAPTER VHI. 



Parturient Laminitis. 



With the Mare,* a few days after foaling or abortion, tnere has been 

 sometimes observed an attack of congestion or inflammation of the feet, 



* It would appear that bovine animals are liable to a foot inflammation after parturition, as well as 

 Mares. Roloff {Mlttheilungen aus der thierarztlichen Praxis in preuszischen Staate, 1865, 1866, p. 

 154) observed a jjeculiar inflammation of the feet of Cows, supervening on parturition. Some days after 

 that event, the skin between the claws was observed to be reddened, swollen, and moist, and gradually the 

 inflammation extended to the coronet and heels (Ballen) ; the skin became more tumefied and dense, and 

 immediately above the claws was uniformly thick and red. In some cases abscesses formed at the coronet, 

 the horn became separated, and finally the whole claw was shed. The mflammation extended to above 

 and behind the fetlock, and the pain was so great that the animals ate but little, and, consequently, they 

 soon lost condition. Tiie hind limbs were most frequently affected : first one, then the other, one being 

 always more affected than the other. The Cows had only calved a short time previously. Roloff supposed 

 that the disease was due to contact of the skin, towards the hind feet, with some substance which had 

 escaped from the vulva after calving. He, therefore, insisted on the utmost cleanliness being observed ; 

 had the stalls cleaned out, and sprinkled with chloride of lime every day, and the hind feet damped with 

 chlorine water, particularly between the claws, and afterwards smeared with oil. By these measures, the 

 extension of the disease was at once checked. 



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