On some of the principal effects resulting from the detachment of fibrinous deposits from the interior of the heart, and their mixture with the circulating blood / by William Senhouse Kirkes.

  • Kirkes, William Senhouse, 1823-1864.
Date:
1852
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On some of the principal effects resulting from the detachment of fibrinous deposits from the interior of the heart, and their mixture with the circulating blood / by William Senhouse Kirkes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    18/46 (page 16)
    The aortic valves were studded by a similar crop of smaller warty vegetations. Lying loose in the cavity of the ventricle were several small brownish nodules of old blood- stained fibrine. The muscular tissue of the heart was generally healthy; but just beneath the lining membrane of the left ventricle, and occasionally deep within its substance, were numerous pale yellow or buff-coloured blotches and streaks surrounded by red borders, and having the general appearance of the changes described under the term of capillary phlebitis. The coronary arteries were healthy; so also was the general arterial system, though the aorta and its main branches were very narrow. The principal venous trunks contained recent coagula, but the two external and internal iliac veins, and both femoral veins, were blocked up by old variously-discoloured masses of firm, friable fibrine. These old coagula were very large, and produced great dis- tension of the veins in which they occurred. There appeared to be no disease of the coats of the veins, and the coagula were nowhere adherent to them; and the arteries leading to the lower extremities were free from old coagula. There was nothing peculiar in the blood generally; the coagula in the right cavities of the heart presented quite ordinary characters. There were a few scattered pleural adhesions. The lungs were generally very oedematous; both lower lobes were consolidated by masses of fibrinous deposit, consisting principally of reddish-brown pulpy material, sur- rounded by darker portions composed of recently extravasated or stagnant blood. In some parts of the right lower lobe were several collections of greenish thick pus, the majority being about the size of peas, a few as lai’ge as a walnut. All the branches of the pulmonary artery leading to the lower lobes, were completely plugged up by old, firm, variously-coloui’ed laminated coagula. The branches going to the upper lobes also contained old coagula, though these were softer, apparently of more recent date, and did not so completely block up the canals of the vessels. The pul- monary veins contained recent coagula. The liver appeared healthy, though pale; and there were no old coagula in any