Hay fever : its causes, treatment, and effective prevention. Experimental researches / by Chas. Harrison Blackley.

  • Blackley, Charles Harrison, 1820-1900.
Date:
1880
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hay fever : its causes, treatment, and effective prevention. Experimental researches / by Chas. Harrison Blackley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    anthum odoratum.' He had been inclined to adopt this view by noticing that ‘ whenever the patient remained closely shut up in a house, even though this was situated in the midst of the richest grass, he suffered considerably less than if he walked abroad into the fields; and if he removed from the country to the centre of a large town he was never at all affected; but the moment he came into or approached a meadow he immediately began to sneeze, and returned home with wheezing and difficult respiration.’ § 28. In summing up his observations Gordon says: I have said that the Anthoxanthum odoratum seems to be the principal exciting cause of hay-asthma, and I am in- duced to come to this conclusion—first, because this plant is one of the most strong-scented of the- grasses; and secondly, because so soon as it begins to flower, and not until then, the asthma commences; as the dowers arrive at perfection the disease increases, and after they have died away I have remarked that patients could pass through the most luxuriant meadow with total impunity. The disease then should rather be denominated grass-asthma than hay- asthma, since hay seems incapable of producing it.* § 29. Elliotson, who was also a contemporary of Bostock’s, argues forcibly against the views entertained by the latter, and reviews his oj:)inions at considerable length.*}* He, how- ever, agrees with Bostock in believing that the disorder is not caused by hay, but, contrary to what the latter affirms, he believes it to ‘depend upon the flower of grass, and pro- bably upon the pollen.’ Elliotson also contends that this view of the case is supported by the circumstances that the disease does not usually appear ‘ till the grass comes into flower ; and as long as there is any flower remaining on the grass the disease continues.’ § 30. In speaking of Bostock’s account of his experience in the Isle of Thanet, when he suffered very little from the disease, and when the heat was so great that nearly all tlie grass was dried up, Elliotson remarks: ‘ I can conceive that a minute quantity of the emanations from the flower of London Medical Gazette, vol. iv., 1829, pp. 266—269. t Ibid., vol. viii., 1831, pp. 411—413.