THE 
VETERINARIAN. 
VOL. XII, No. 138.] JUNE 1839. [New Series, No. 78. 
HIPPO-PATHOLOGY. 
Bronchitis. 
By Wm. Percivall, Esq., M.R.C.S., 1 st Life Guards. 
DERIVATION. — From fipoyHog and itis : literally, inflammation ot‘ 
the throat. A disease so called from its seat being the bronchial 
tubes. 
SYNONYMY. — In old works on farriery we find what we con- 
sider to have been this disorder called morefoundering, a word 
derived from the French appellations, morfondement , morfondure. 
By old writers on human medicine the disease has been described 
as peripneumonia notha, from its having been regarded as a sort of 
false inflammation of the lungs. Of late years it has got the 
name of pulmonary catarrh , which we have no less authority than 
the great Laennec’s for prefering to the one — in compliance with 
custom — we have adopted above. 
Kinds. — Bronchitis may exist either by itself or at the same 
time with another disease, in which latter case it is said to be com- 
plicated. In either case it may be acute or chronic : in the compli- 
cated form it may, in reference to the disease with which it co-exists, 
be either primary or secondary. Moreover, it may be epidemic. 
The Causes of catarrh are the causes of bronchitis. The same 
membrane pervades the air-passages ; and though from its situation 
within the lungs it is less exposed than within the head, still is 
it much under the influence of atmospheric changes and noxious 
inhalations. Independently, however, of these causes, there are 
others which in a peculiar degree operate upon the bronchial 
membrane. It is well known that this membrane, vast in its su- 
perficial extent, is closely allied in its function of secretion with 
the skin ; and not with the skin alone, but with other mucous 
membranes of the body as well, particularly the one lining the ali- 
mentary canal. Cold or wet suddenly applied to the surface of the 
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