CIRRHOSIS IN CATTLE. 



This has been recorded by different observers and usually as 

 the result of some obstacle to the circulation, or of catarrh and 

 obstruction of the biliary passages. Morot saw it in young 

 calves, which showed greatly enlarged liver (in one case 24 lbs.) 

 and kidneys, the former containing numerous cysts and marked 

 sclerous thickening around the vessels. This advancing thicken- 

 ing of the connective tissue, causes increasing firmness of the 

 liver and absorption, distortion and diminution of the lobules. 

 Albrecht describes a chronic interstitial hepatitis with caseated 

 centres (nontuberculous) many of them an inch in diameter. 

 The liver is brown or grayish with whiter callosities which ex- 

 tend into its substance and make points of attachment to the 

 diaphragm or other adjacent organ. The contrast between the 

 fibrous layers and the hepatic tissue has been likened to a 

 checkerboard (Hbhmann). The enlarged liver may weigh 30 

 lbs. ; in one remarkable case it weighed 300 lbs. (Adam). The 

 bile is of a light color and mixed with mucus. 



Symptoms. The symptoms are indefinite : a gradually in- 

 creasing jaundice, the passage of yellowish red urine becoming 

 more and more red and albuminous, and finally coagulating on 

 the walls of the urethra or on the litter, chronic indigestion, 

 salivation (Schaffer), weakness, breathlessness and more or less 

 fever may give indications of the disorder. Hohmann failed to 

 find tenderne.ss of the right hypochondrium. The disease 

 is liable to go on to a fatal issue, .so that it is often sought to 

 prepare the animal for the butcher. 



Treatment will follow the same line as in the hor.se. Green 

 food, pasturage, open air life, saline laxatives, and alkalies with 

 a free use of potassium iodide to check the sclerosis will be indi- 

 cated. 



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