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A FREAK OF NATURE ?
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permanent left superior quadrantic hemianopia was due to human agency, and from the circumstances proved by an autopsy to be due to a softening of attending its discovery it would, if taken at his the whole lower half of the right visual cortex, valuation, be of great importance for the solution caused by an occlusion of this vessel. It may be of the problem of the antiquity of mankind. But added that cases of transient hemianopia resulting Dr. Charles W. Andrews, of the Natural History from severe concussion of the cerebral cortex following upon wounds of the occipital region have recently been noted by Captain M. L. Hinein which more or less complete recovery took place, the recovery for colour vision always lagging behind that for form vision. In cases of quadrantic hemianopia from war wounds it is usually the lower quadrant that is affected, the reason for this being that cases which recover are almost always due to wounds affecting the upper part of the visual cortex; not that the upper part is any more liable to be wounded than the lower, but whereas with occlusion of the calcarine artery the results are limited to the area of the cortex supplied by that vessel, wounds of the same region generally involve the medulla and cerebellum as well, so that the patient rarely survives. A FREAK OF
NATURE ?
Museum, in a letter to Nature of March 13th, says that " the object is nothing more than a somewhat
imperfect natural cast of a chamber of the shell of an Ammonite," and as Mr. Reid Moir, so far as we have seen, has not responded to the implied challenge the hopes raised by him may be doomed to disappointment. ---
LEFT SCAPULAR PAIN AND HYPERALGESIA IN HEART DISEASE. THE significance of symptoms in the diagnosis of
disease and in the estimation of its degree is receiving exact study in many departments of medicine. In pulmonary tuberculosis it is practically impossible to express an opinion as to the nature and stage of the disease without careful correlation of the symptoms with the physical signs observed. In heart disease the symptoms afford a valuable measure of the degree of the derangement of function caused by the lesion indicated by the physical signs and of the necessity for treatment. That various cardiac conditions are associated with some degree of praecordial pain and tenderness has long been familiar, but the extent, character, and radiations
To the philosopher the capacity for error which he observes in his fellows, and particularly in his fellow philosophers, is a perennial source of surprises, and there is one branch of study-that of man’s earliest history-which, on account of the of these pains have perhaps not received the attenmystery surrounding it and of the zeal which its tion they deserve except in the case of angina fascination inspires, is especially productive of We publish in this week’s issue of questionable conclusions. Dickens illuminated the pectoris. THE LANCET an interesting and suggestive note subject with some satiric flashes in his story of the Dr. John Parkinson upon a little-recognised form antiquarian discovery made at Cobham, and less by of cardiac pain and tenderness-namely, that eminent students of nature than the immortal Pickwick have also been misled by appearances. occurring in the left scapular region. He has made a careful study of 50 cases in which these One has accepted as evidence of the artistic conditions were observed. The scapular pain development of cave man the daubs on the wall of is usually referred to a spot just below or a boat-builder’s former paint store; another has " internal to the lower of the left scapula, found neolithic pot-boilers on the site of a though it is sometimesangle felt along the vertebral Jubilee bonfire. From time to time there are unborder half of the scapula. of the lower earthed prodigies which may deceive the very elect. It is always accompanied by subapparently The fossil shell from the red crag described a few is more which generally recognised mammary pain, years ago by Dr. Marie C. Stopes, to the Prehistoric as of cardiac The scapular pain is usually origin. is a case in of East Anglia, perhaps point. a later manifestation, though in a few patients it Society It bore upon its surface a face of the kind which appeared to originate at the same time as the subvery youthful artists draw in these days, but The hyperalgesia was less frequently which, possibly, in the childhood of the race repre- mammary. than the pain, and its extent was variable, present sented the highest flights of the limner’s art. Many as shown in the record of 10 cases given by Dr. geologists regarded it as a genuine product of Parkinson. The conditions in which left subwe have had, also primeval culture. More recently " and scapular pain was observed included mammary from East Anglia, a similar freak." It is a mass valvular and myocardial disease, arterio-sclerosis of chalk, about 4 inches long and between 2 and and renal disease with cardiac embarrassment, 3 inches in its other dimensions, which bears a when associated with high blood fantastic resemblance to a mammoth, an animal especially also "functional"" heart disease and pressure; with which the present generation has not even a conditions of general ill-health with inefficient nodding acquaintance, though enough is known action of the heart. As might be expected, Dr. about its appearance to justify us in calling it Parkinson finds the explanation of these symptoms Elephas primigenius. The model, or as he prefers in the well-recognised principle of referred pain in to call it, statue, was described and figured in the visceral disease, so ably elucidated by Dr. Henry anthropological review, Man, for February last by Head and Sir James Mackenzie. He finds that the Mr. Reid Moir, who is well known among geologists sixth thoracic segment alone or in combination on account of his enthusiasm in the search for flint the fifth supplies the submammary and with implements, and to the general public as being scapular regions to which the pain is usually referred. for the in the recent appearance responsible The hyperalgesia corresponds to the same segments, agony" column of the Tivies of one of the oddest though it may extend to a larger area. He regards contributions ever made even to that quaint gallery the development of hypersesthesia in cases of -we mean the advertisement for the Foxhall or disorder, especially when mandible. Mr. Reid Moir regards the shaping of chronic heart disease it or recurs, as indicating a new and more persists the piece of chalk discovered at Saxmundham as obstinate stage. In his opinion the hypersestheaia 3 Brit. Journal of induces and supplements the pain since it may be Ophthalmology, January, 1918. "
permanent left superior quadrantic hemianopia was due to human agency, and from the circumstances proved by an autopsy to be due to a softening of attending its discovery it would, if taken at his the whole lower half of the right visual cortex, valuation, be of great importance for the solution caused by an occlusion of this vessel. It may be of the problem of the antiquity of mankind. But added that cases of transient hemianopia resulting Dr. Charles W. Andrews, of the Natural History from severe concussion of the cerebral cortex following upon wounds of the occipital region have recently been noted by Captain M. L. Hinein which more or less complete recovery took place, the recovery for colour vision always lagging behind that for form vision. In cases of quadrantic hemianopia from war wounds it is usually the lower quadrant that is affected, the reason for this being that cases which recover are almost always due to wounds affecting the upper part of the visual cortex; not that the upper part is any more liable to be wounded than the lower, but whereas with occlusion of the calcarine artery the results are limited to the area of the cortex supplied by that vessel, wounds of the same region generally involve the medulla and cerebellum as well, so that the patient rarely survives. A FREAK OF
NATURE ?
Museum, in a letter to Nature of March 13th, says that " the object is nothing more than a somewhat
imperfect natural cast of a chamber of the shell of an Ammonite," and as Mr. Reid Moir, so far as we have seen, has not responded to the implied challenge the hopes raised by him may be doomed to disappointment. ---
LEFT SCAPULAR PAIN AND HYPERALGESIA IN HEART DISEASE. THE significance of symptoms in the diagnosis of
disease and in the estimation of its degree is receiving exact study in many departments of medicine. In pulmonary tuberculosis it is practically impossible to express an opinion as to the nature and stage of the disease without careful correlation of the symptoms with the physical signs observed. In heart disease the symptoms afford a valuable measure of the degree of the derangement of function caused by the lesion indicated by the physical signs and of the necessity for treatment. That various cardiac conditions are associated with some degree of praecordial pain and tenderness has long been familiar, but the extent, character, and radiations
To the philosopher the capacity for error which he observes in his fellows, and particularly in his fellow philosophers, is a perennial source of surprises, and there is one branch of study-that of man’s earliest history-which, on account of the of these pains have perhaps not received the attenmystery surrounding it and of the zeal which its tion they deserve except in the case of angina fascination inspires, is especially productive of We publish in this week’s issue of questionable conclusions. Dickens illuminated the pectoris. THE LANCET an interesting and suggestive note subject with some satiric flashes in his story of the Dr. John Parkinson upon a little-recognised form antiquarian discovery made at Cobham, and less by of cardiac pain and tenderness-namely, that eminent students of nature than the immortal Pickwick have also been misled by appearances. occurring in the left scapular region. He has made a careful study of 50 cases in which these One has accepted as evidence of the artistic conditions were observed. The scapular pain development of cave man the daubs on the wall of is usually referred to a spot just below or a boat-builder’s former paint store; another has " internal to the lower of the left scapula, found neolithic pot-boilers on the site of a though it is sometimesangle felt along the vertebral Jubilee bonfire. From time to time there are unborder half of the scapula. of the lower earthed prodigies which may deceive the very elect. It is always accompanied by subapparently The fossil shell from the red crag described a few is more which generally recognised mammary pain, years ago by Dr. Marie C. Stopes, to the Prehistoric as of cardiac The scapular pain is usually origin. is a case in of East Anglia, perhaps point. a later manifestation, though in a few patients it Society It bore upon its surface a face of the kind which appeared to originate at the same time as the subvery youthful artists draw in these days, but The hyperalgesia was less frequently which, possibly, in the childhood of the race repre- mammary. than the pain, and its extent was variable, present sented the highest flights of the limner’s art. Many as shown in the record of 10 cases given by Dr. geologists regarded it as a genuine product of Parkinson. The conditions in which left subwe have had, also primeval culture. More recently " and scapular pain was observed included mammary from East Anglia, a similar freak." It is a mass valvular and myocardial disease, arterio-sclerosis of chalk, about 4 inches long and between 2 and and renal disease with cardiac embarrassment, 3 inches in its other dimensions, which bears a when associated with high blood fantastic resemblance to a mammoth, an animal especially also "functional"" heart disease and pressure; with which the present generation has not even a conditions of general ill-health with inefficient nodding acquaintance, though enough is known action of the heart. As might be expected, Dr. about its appearance to justify us in calling it Parkinson finds the explanation of these symptoms Elephas primigenius. The model, or as he prefers in the well-recognised principle of referred pain in to call it, statue, was described and figured in the visceral disease, so ably elucidated by Dr. Henry anthropological review, Man, for February last by Head and Sir James Mackenzie. He finds that the Mr. Reid Moir, who is well known among geologists sixth thoracic segment alone or in combination on account of his enthusiasm in the search for flint the fifth supplies the submammary and with implements, and to the general public as being scapular regions to which the pain is usually referred. for the in the recent appearance responsible The hyperalgesia corresponds to the same segments, agony" column of the Tivies of one of the oddest though it may extend to a larger area. He regards contributions ever made even to that quaint gallery the development of hypersesthesia in cases of -we mean the advertisement for the Foxhall or disorder, especially when mandible. Mr. Reid Moir regards the shaping of chronic heart disease it or recurs, as indicating a new and more persists the piece of chalk discovered at Saxmundham as obstinate stage. In his opinion the hypersestheaia 3 Brit. Journal of induces and supplements the pain since it may be Ophthalmology, January, 1918. "