ASCARIS LUMBRTCOFDES. 
47 
ASCARIS LUM6RIC0IDES IN THE LIVER AND 
PANCREAS OF IAN. 
By Albert J. Chalmers, M.D., F.R.C.S. 
Registrar of the Ceylon Medical College . 
With two figures. 
A SCARIS LUMBRICOIDES is one of the commonest parasites 
of man, and in Ceylon it is seldom that the human faeces 
are examined, at all events in natives, without the ova being 
seen, and certainly during the last three years I have never 
performed an autopsy in the General Hospital, Colombo, without 
finding the worm in the intestine. 
It is also exceedingly usual to find that the worm has wandered 
from the alimentary canal into some part of the body, e.g., the 
mouth, larynx, lungs, nose ; and some sixty-eight cases are recorded 
of invasion of the bile duct, but it is by no means so common to 
find that a person dies from the effects of Ascaris lumbricoides , 
and to find post-mortem that it has caused serious lesions of 
an organ like the liver. It is also not common to find that 
it has invaded the pancreas, only about nine cases being recorded. 
The following is an account of a case in which death was 
directly due to Ascaris lumbricoides. 
An autopsy was required upon a Tamil woman, aged 29, who 
had died with obscure symptoms. On entering the post-mortem 
room, I was immediately struck with a peculiarly unpleasant 
odour arising from the body, which was in no way decomposed 
having died in the early hours of the morning, which was cold, 
the post-mortem being held ten and a half hours after death 
It was noticed that ascarides had escaped by the mouth and 
the anus, but there was nothing unusual in these observations. 
On opening the body the odour which was previously noted 
increased when the abdomen was cut into. 
The points of interest are with regard to the abdominal organs, 
which alone will be described. 
The peritoneum was injected, and its cavity contained ten ounces 
of clear straw-coloured fluid. 
The stomach was normal in every respect. 
