304 Wound Infection; Suppuration 



puerperal fever, and scarlatina are upon record in which 

 the serum seems to have exerted a beneficial action, and it 

 may be that antiphlogistic serums will occupy an important 

 place in the medicine of the future. 



The serum is prepared by the injection of cultures of 

 living virulent streptococci into horses until a high degree 

 of immunity is attained. The serum is probably both 

 antitoxic and bactericidal in action. 



The success following the serums of some experimenters 

 upon certain cases, and their occasional or constant failure 

 in other cases, have suggested that there is considerable 

 difference between different " strains" or families of strep- 

 tococci. To obviate this inequality Van de Velde has made 

 a polyvalent antistreptococcus serum by using a number 

 of different cultures secured from the most diverse clinical 

 cases of streptococcus infection. Another serum, of Tavel 

 and Moser, is made by using cultures from different cases 

 of scarlatina. The use of these serums, however, has not 

 given the satisfaction expected, and at the present moment 

 the whole subject of antistreptococcus serums is debatable 

 both from the standpoint of its theoretical scientific basis 

 and its therapeutic application. 



STREPTOCOCCUS ERYSIPELATUS (FEHLEISEN). 



The streptococcus of Rosenbach is generally thought to 

 be identical with a streptococcus described by Fehleisen * as 

 Streptococcus erysipelatis (Fig. 93). 



The streptococcus of erysipelas can be obtained in almost 

 pure culture from the serum which oozes from a puncture 

 made in the margin of an erysipelatous patch. They are 

 small cocci, usually forming chains of from six to ten indi- 

 viduals, but sometimes reaching a hundred or more in num- 

 ber. Occasionally the chains occur in tangled masses. 



They can be cultivated at the room temperature, but grow 

 much better at 3o-37 C. They are not particularly sensi- 

 tive to the presence or absence of oxygen, but perhaps de- 

 velop a little more rapidly in its presence. The cultural 

 appearances are identical with those of Streptococcus 

 pyogenes. 



When injected into animals Fehleisen 's coccus behaves 

 exactly like Streptococcus pyogenes. 



* " Verhandlungen der Wiirzburger med. Gesellschaft," 1881. 





