Rheumatoid arthritis : its pathology, morbid anatomy, and treatment / by Gilbert A. Bannatyne.

  • Bannatyne, Gilbert A. (Alexander)
Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Rheumatoid arthritis : its pathology, morbid anatomy, and treatment / by Gilbert A. Bannatyne. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    arthritis. Now how much better would it be were we content with one name only, even if that one did not actually describe the condition with perfect accuracy ? What an amount of confusion might have been saved ! This want of exactitude in nomenclature would soon have been compensated for in our increased knowledge, which we would have been enabled to store up and note for comparison about a complaint, the study of which, and the disentanglement of whose literature and prevail- ing impressions, are enough to appal even the boldest. Many and various are the theories which, at one time or another, have been advanced to explain the congeries of symptoms called rheumatoid arthritis; and many and various are the diseases, which, at one time or another, have come under our notice labelled rheumatoid arthritis, osteo-arthritis, rheumatic gout, etc., these terms being, as a rule, quite indiscriminately apportioned. No wonder confusion has reigned supreme. As far as our still limited knowledge renders possible, I will endeavour to throw a ray of light into the obscurity surrounding the aetiology and pathology of the disease, with the hope that it will, in the near future, enable us to walk with surer footsteps. Of the many names used to designale the acute or destructive form of the disorder, I have here assumed that that of rheumatoid arthritis is the one best known to the largest number, and, therefore, the one best suited to be used permanently. It, in my opinion, is the one fulfilling to the greatest extent the requirements of science. This term was first applied by Garrod, and although it implies a condition which many deny exists, yet I think, from every point of view, it is the most suit- able. It has been objected that the word Eheumatoid, which means, freely translated, like rheumatism, is mis- leading ; so it is, to a certain extent. Yet no one