The clinical examination of the urine in relation to disease / by C. Black.

  • Black, C.
Date:
1870
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The clinical examination of the urine in relation to disease / by C. Black. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    11/60 (page 7)
    In the rapid strides which animal chemistry is making, it would be a manifestation of a want of faith in the progress of chemical science, to expect that the analysis of the urine, as now given, will continue to represent our full knowledge of its constitution. There are even now certain constituents whose chemical composition is as yet unknown, and which are, for the want of a more definite know- ledge, known only by the vague terms of “ undefined principles” and “ extractives.” I look forward with perfect confidence to the time when these “ undefined principles ” will, in the progress of chemical science, receive a perfect solution and be reduced to formulae as accurate as that which represents the chemical consti- tution of urea. I have equal faith in my impression, that the future of animal chemistry will bring to light other and, as yet, undiscovered principles of the urine, and that the list of urinary constituents will be swelled by additions to our knowledge, of se- condary importance only to the great principle of urea. My present object, however, is not with these “ undefined,” and with these probably undiscovered, principles, but with those which have al- ready been discovered, and whose chemical constitution is well understood. With such my object is, to ascertain to what extent they are increased, decreased, or in any way modified by disease, and to apply the knowledge thus obtained to the mitigation of human suffering and to the removal of its cause. Much informa- tion may be gathered by watching, at the bedside of our patients, the fluctuations which these urinary constituents undergo from day to day, the particular periods of the disease at which they occur, and by associating them with the change in degree of symptoms with which they are accompanied, the nature of the disease which exists, and the particular organ which is affected. In this sense the aim and scope of this paper are practical. QUANTITY OF URINE IN DISEASE. The quantity of urine in disease must be determined by reference to the quantity which is discharged by the healthy body in a given time. Now, the quantity of urine secreted by a healthy adult has a certain range, and is influenced by certain conditions. Under the ordinary conditions of life the quantity may, for the winter, be noted as forty ounces in the twenty-four hours; and as thirty ounces for the same period during the summer. The cause of the