IDIOSYNCRASIES 615 



Among the commoner examples of this form of allergy or anaphylaxis 

 may be mentioned : 



1. Horse asthma, observed among those persons who are seized with 

 sneezing, cough, dyspnea, coryza, and prostration when they come near 

 horses, as in a stable or when driving. 



2. Hay-fever, first ascribed to the pollen of plants by Elliotson in 

 1831, and thoroughly studied by Dunbar. Wolff-Eisner was the first 

 to regard the reaction as a phenomenon of hypersensitivity or anaphy- 

 laxis. Individuals subject to hay-fever show a uniform series of symp- 

 toms at certain definite seasons, either in the early summer or in autumn. 

 These are a reddening, swelling, and watering of the eyes, sneezing, a 

 sore feeling in the throat and larynx, and asthmatic disorders. The 

 instillation into the eye of a 1 per cent, solution of pollen in physiologic 

 salt solution is usually sufficient to elicit a typical attack. Certain 

 persons are susceptible to various weeds, and each usually knows the 

 particular weed to avoid. In hay-fever we have the most marked in- 

 stances of extreme hypersensitiveness; persons may be seized with an 

 attack when some distance from the particular weed in question. Similar 



phenomena are observed among persons susceptible to poison ivy, sumac, 

 workers in satinwood (satinwood dermatitis), and other forms of der- 

 matitis venenaia. 



3. Food Anaphylaxis. Certain foods, as eggs, buckwheat (phago- 

 pyrismus), pork, oysters, clams, lobsters, cheese, strawberries, goose- 

 berries, and even vegetables, may act as poisons when ingested by per- 

 sons who are hypersensitive to them. The symptoms are quite varied 

 and are not all understood, as the subject is still in the experimental 

 stage and requires much investigation from both the laboratory and 

 clinical sides. Asthma has been frequently associated with a condition 

 of hypersensitiveness or allergy to certain foods by Goodale, 1 Smith, 2 

 Talbot, 3 Schloss, 4 and others. Symptoms referable to the alimentary 

 tract vary from a feeling of "indigestion" and "heartburn" to severe 

 diarrhea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. Various skin diseases, and par- 

 ticularly chronic eczema, urticaria, and angioneurotic edema, have been 

 ascribed to food hypersensitiveness by Hazen, 5 McBride and Shorer, 6 

 White, 7 Strickler and Goldberg, 8 and Blackfan. 9 The withdrawal of 



1 Boston Med. and Surg. Jour., 1914, clxx, No. 22. 



2 Archiv. Inter. Med., 1909, 3, 350. 



3 Boston Med. and Surg. Jour., 1914, 171, 708. 



4 Amer. Jour. Dis. Children, 1912, 3, 341. 



5 Jour. Amer. Med. Assoc., 1914, Ixii, 695. 



6 Jour. Cutan. Dis., 1916, 34, No. 2. 7 Jour. Cutan. Dis., 1916, 34, 55. 



8 Jour. Amer. Med. Assoc., 1916, Ixvi, 249. 



9 Amer. Jour. Dis. Children, 1916, 1, 441. 



