The distribution of tuberculous diseases in Glasgow ; with observations on the relation of phthisis to room-density / by A.K. Chalmers.

  • Chalmers, A. K. (Archibald Kerr), 1856-1942.
Date:
[1897?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The distribution of tuberculous diseases in Glasgow ; with observations on the relation of phthisis to room-density / by A.K. Chalmers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    becomes Other Forms of Tuberculosis (Scrofula), and into one or other of these four classes every form of tuberculous disease causing death is placed. The sum of the injury inflicted on a population by tuberculous disease is notwholly represented, however, by the deaths which it causes. Much, indeed the major part, of the diseases of glands, bones, and joints, requiring surgical interference, arises from this cause, and, short of causing death, these may result in serious injury to health and permanent disablement. It is impossible at present to form any estimate of the injury to a population thus arising. It would be erroneous to apply hospital returns to the general population, because the age-proportions do not correspond. But this objection does not apply where they are used simply to indicate the prevalence of tuberculous diseases among those who seek hospital treatment. I have gone over the records of the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Glasgow for the last seven years, 1890-6, and find that about 24 per cent, of its admissions (4,164), and 35 per cent, of its deaths (486) were due to diseases of this class, and this proportion might have been increased by a more rigid scrutiny of the various causes of spinal disease. And while tuberculous disease may develop in any of the organs of the body, there remains this distinc- tion between Phthisis and certain of the other forms which tuberculous disease assumes, that while Phthisis, in adults at least, may be regarded as to a large extent determined by the surroundings of the individual (aerial infection), the forms of tuberculous