Guide to the examination of urine : with special reference to the diseases of the urinary apparatus / by K.B. Hoffman and R. Ultzmann.

Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Guide to the examination of urine : with special reference to the diseases of the urinary apparatus / by K.B. Hoffman and R. Ultzmann. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

    39/220 (page 21)
    CHAPTER III. THE URINE. A.—In General. Urine is the secretion of the kidney, and in the normal condition represents a solution of those substances that pertain to retrograde metamorphosis. It is a solution of urea and common salt, to which are added, in small quan- tities, other organic and inorganic constitutents of the blood, also, certain substances introduced into the system which are excreted either in their unchanged condition or after having undergone a chemical decomposition. In the normal condition the urine contains organic constituents (urea, uric acid, creatinine, hippuric acid, xan- thine, lactic acid, grape sugar, etc., Briicke); inorganic constituents (chloride of sodium, phosphate of sodium, calcium and magnesium, sulphates of the alkalis, salts of ammonium and iron, in combination with the coloring matter and gases, carbonic oxide, nitrogen and oxygen). In pathological urine there can be detected, in addition to these normal substances, albumen, grape sugar, inosit, con- stituents of bile, fats, sulphide of hydrogen, blood coloring matter, uorerythrine (Heller), leucine and tyrosine, calcic car- bonate and oxalate, carbonate of ammonium, cystine, pus, blood, epithelial structures, spermatozoa, fungi and infusoria. Before considering the symptomatological value of urine, we must look at its properties (as far as they interest us) and the most valuable methods for its examination.