CHAPTER II 



FIRST STUDIES ON ANAPHYLAXIS 



Experiments of Richet and Portier on dogs with actino-congestin 

 in 1902 — Experiments carried out by Arthus with serum on 

 rabbits in 1903 — Observations on the effect produced by 

 repeated injections of serum in man by v. Pirquet and 

 Schick in 1903 — Experiments carried out by Otto, and 

 Rosenau and Anderson, on guinea-pigs in 1906 — First papers 

 on the subject of anaphylaxis and an ti- anaphylaxis by 

 Besredka and Steinhardt in 1907. 



Although attention had already been drawn to 

 hypersensitiveness in the more general acceptation of 

 the term by Koch, Hayem, Behring, Brieger, Knorr, 

 Flexner, and J. and P. Courmont, Rist, and others 

 (even by Magendie as early as 1839), it is to Charles 

 Richet that we owe not only the felicitously chosen 

 term of "anaphylaxis," but also the creation of the 

 subject itself. It was through a series of researches 

 carried out by him, first on the serum of snake poison, 

 but more especially later on the toxins of Actiniae, 

 that this new idea gained admission to the domain 

 of biology. It was Richet who showed that it was 

 not a question of one isolated fact, but of a pheno- 

 menon with a wide significance. 



Whilst studying the poisonous action of Actiniae, 

 Richet and Portier succeeded in extracting a par- 

 ticular poison the toxic dose of which could be de- 

 termined with precision. This they called congestin, 

 on account of its possessing the property of setting 

 up in inoculated animals an intense congestion of all 

 the viscera — stomach, liver, kidneys, and intestine. 



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