428 Diseases of the Genital Organs 



genital tube, with the oviducts interposed as highly com- 

 plex, sinuous, narrow tubules. While the oviducts are 

 highly efficient in preventing the migration of infection 

 from the uterus and more external areas into the peritoneal 

 cavity, the same complexity makes of them a lodging-place 

 for infection which, once attained, is unusually refractory 

 to dislodgment by physiologic, medicinal, or surgical agen- 

 cies. Since, in probably more than 90 per cent, of cases of 

 infection in the oviducts, the condition is bilateral, the du- 

 plication of ovaries and oviducts avails little ; when disease 

 in one oviduct constitutes an insurmountable obstacle to 

 conception, there are nine chances in ten that the other tube 

 is likewise barred. Consequently tubal infection generally 

 closes permanently the reproductive career of the animal. 

 The clinician and the animal husbandman are further baf- 

 fled in the present state of knowledge by the difficulty in 

 many cases of making an early diagnosis, causing incurable 

 animals to be held for long periods at great economic loss 

 before the character of the disease is clearly revealed. The 

 anatomic and histologic lesions caused by tubal infection 

 are endless in variety. Three outstnding types occur. 



1. Salpingitis Unaccompanied by Enlargement of the 



Ducts of a Degree Clinically Recognizable by 



Palpation, or Macroscopically Visible 



upon post-mortem examination 



Salpingitis, or inflammation of the oviducts, without ma- 

 terial enlargement, is the commonest and most important 

 type of disease of these organs. Ordinarily the infection 

 does not cause a sufficient degree of enlargement to enable 

 the veterinarian to make a diagnosis by palpation per rec- 

 tum. Upon post-mortem inspection, the oviduct shows little 

 macroscopic evidence of disease. The principal clinical evi- 

 dences of salpingitis are persistent sterility without palpable 

 lesions in the genital tract, as a rule associated with cystic 

 degeneration of the corpus luteum, with irregular estrual 

 cycles, and later with adhesion of the pavilion of the tube to 

 the ovary. 



