Practical manual of the diseases of the heart and great vessels ... / By F.A. Aran ... Translated from the French, by Wm. A. Harris, M.D.

  • Aran, F. A. (François Amilcar), 1817-1861.
Date:
1843
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Practical manual of the diseases of the heart and great vessels ... / By F.A. Aran ... Translated from the French, by Wm. A. Harris, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    gular, unequal, and intermittent pulse; intolerable feeling of anguish and suffocation; sleeplessness ; continual agitation; coldness of the extremities; livid colour of the face; nausea and continued vomitings, and in some cases stupor and feeble convulsive movements. B. Local Symptoms. — The pulsations of the heart become extremely confused and irregular; the dulness on percussion increases when the polypous concretion is so excessive as to distend the éavi- ties of the heart. Auscultation renders évident a notable diminution in the resonance of the sounds of the heart, which become dull and stifled. Under some circumstances, where a polypous concre- tion is caught by a valve, or hangs fréely in an orifice, as in a case which wè have seen, a soft murmur is heard, whose maximum varies accord- ing to the seat of the polypous concretions and the “affected orifice. This murmur can only be con- sidered as a sign of the existence of a polypus, when we can ascertain: Ist, that there did not exist any anteriorly ; 2d, that it does not depend on an inflammatory affection of the valves of the heart. Diagnosis. — When an extreme irregularity of the pulsations of the heart and arteries is observed to supervene, in conjunction with all the general and local symptoms which have just beer noticed, there can be little doubt respecting the presence of a polypous concretion in the heart. The difficult cases are those in which there existed already a disease of the heart, with irregularity in the beats of this organ. Rs ces in thesé last cases, if the irregularity be suddenly aggravated, if the beats become abnormal, more confused, more obscure, if all the preceding general symptoms are found, it