PART II 



THE INFECTIOUS DISEASES AND THE 

 SPECIFIC MICRO-ORGANISMS 



CHAPTER I 

 SUPPURATION 



Suppuration was at one time looked upon as a normal and in- 

 evitable outcome of the majority of wounds, and although bacteria 

 were early observed in the purulent discharges, the insufficiency of 

 information then at hand led to the belief that they were spon- 

 taneously developed there. 



It is probable that the first contribution to the infectious nature 

 of pyemia and sepsis was made by Rindfleisch* who found micro- 

 organisms in the metastatic abscesses in the heart muscle of a patient 

 dead of pyemia. Similar observations were subsequently made by 

 numerous others, but the first to definitely connect them with the 

 process was Klebs.f In 1874 Billroth described a micro-organism 

 that he called Coccobacteria septica, but which he regarded as an 

 effect, not a cause of suppuration. In 1880 Pasteurf cultivated 

 streptococci from cases of puerperal fever and looked upon therS as 

 the cause of the disease. It was only after Koch|| had broken the 

 way for the really scientific investigation of the subject, that Ogston§ 

 was able to show that there were two principal micro-organisms con- 

 cerned in suppuration, one occurring in groups resembling bunches 

 of grapes or fish-roe, called Staphylococci, the other like strings of 

 beads, called Streptococci. 



Other investigators followed and confirmed the work of Ogston, 

 and Fehleisen,** and Rosenbachft finally settled the relation of the 

 common organisms to the process of suppuration. 



Suppuration, is not a specific infectious process. 



Being but the expression of tissue irritation accompanied by strong 

 chemotactic influences, as many bacteria may be. associated with it 

 as can bring about the essential conditions. Bacteria with which 



* "Lehrbuch des Pathologischen Gewebslehre," 1866. 



^ Beitrage zur. path. Ajiat. d. Schusswunden, Leipzig, 1872. 



"Compt.-rendu. de la Soc. de Biol, de Paris, 1880, xc, p. 1035. 



I Untersuchungen iiber die Aetiologie des Wundinfektionskrankheiten," 

 1878 Leipzig,. 



§"Brit. Med. Jour.," 1881, March, p. 369. 

 **^^ Aetiologie des Erysipels," Berlin, 1883. 

 tt"Mikroorganismen bei der Wundinfektionskrankheiten," Wiesbaden, 1884. 



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