ANALYSIS OF THE URINE. 



341 



and obstacles to the circulation in the posterior vena cava. Causes : 

 a diminution of the filtering pressure in the kidneys, also lessening 

 of the arterial pressure (cardiac weakness), and alterations of the 

 filtering membrane. 



4. Certain blood diseases. (Anemia, leukemia, diabetes, etc.) 

 Causes : alterations or decomposition of the blood. 



5. Nervous affections. (Epilepsy, tetanus, diseases of the spinal 

 cord.) The cause is derived from circulatory troubles in the 

 kidneys. 



So-called physiological albuminuria has been found in man in 

 ten to twenty per cent, of the examined cases ; it is ascribed to 

 violent muscular efforts, to colds, to food rich in albumin, also to 

 emotion, etc. No special study has as yet been made upon this 

 subject in our domestic animals. We must, however, mention one 

 of Frohner's tables, according to which he found but two cases of 

 slightly albuminous urine in a total of fifty healthy horses examined 

 for this condition. 



Albuminuria of gestation, which is quite frequent in the human 

 race, has been observed by Franke in cows at an advanced period 

 of pregnancy. We have made a fruitless effort to demonstrate the 

 presence of albumin in gestating cows, mares, and bitches. Pflug 

 and Gross have not succeeded any better.^ 



Albuminuria of newly-born animals, appearing in the first days 

 following birth, has only been established in the child ; nothing 

 like it has ever been seen in our young animals. Senator ascribes 

 it to post-partum blood pressure, to the destruction of a considerable 

 number of blood corpuscles, and to the abstraction of water by the 

 transudation which takes place through the skin and lungs. 



Examination for albumin in urine. The urine may con- 

 tain several of the varieties of albumin contained in the blood ; in 

 the majority of cases we find in it the albumin and globulin of the 

 serum ; more rarely propeptoue (hemialbumose) and peptone. We 

 have not to consider here albumin contained in urine when this is 

 more or less mixed with blood or pus. Among the numerous 

 methods which enable us to recognize the presence of albumin in 

 urine the following are to be recommended : 



1. Add nitric acid to cold urine: when it contains albumin, a 

 precipitate or a manifest turbidity of the liquid sets in, according to 

 the case. The precipitate of nitrate of urea, which is sometimes 



1 Pflug and Gross (unpublished communication). 



