The diseases of children / by James Frederic Goodhart.

  • Goodhart, James Frederic, Sir, 1845-1916.
Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The diseases of children / by James Frederic Goodhart. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    child, with tottering gait and jactitating arms, comes for treatment. _ The hrst thing that occurs to one is the possible existence of tumour of pons or cerebellum. As a mere question of muscular disorder, such a case might readily pass for one of tumour. The decision must rest upon the existence or not of other evidences of tumour, such as optic neuritis, headache, vomiting, and the like. Facial Paralysis, of any persistence and complete- ness, is, in adults, far more commonly due to peripheral causes, such as exposure, than to any known central lesion. In children exposure is seldom in evidence. I have seen such cases a few times, and always in girls of five to eight years; Henoch andSteiner have recorded cases of this kind. Palsy occurs sometimes in infants soon after birth, and is due to injury in delivery. It usually passes off within a short time, but the affec- tion sometimes remains throughout life. A con- genital and irremediable form is described by Henoch, the cause of which is unknown. Abscesses and enlarged glands behind the angle of the jaw also produce facial paralysis; and it has been known to result from congenital syphilis (Barlow); but, more usually, it connotes aural discharge and disease of the middle ear. Such cases are prone to die from tuberculosis. Disease of the ear may cause abscess of the brain and suppurative meningitis, as in later life; but my own experience quite coincides with that of others, that tuberculosis, in one part or another, is liable to svipervene when aural discharge and facial paralysis are co-existent. There is usually extensive disease of the temporal bone in such cases, and perhaps it is thus that it is an evidence of the tubercular tendency. Facial paralysis is, therefore, often of very sinister omen in infants and young children. Hemiatrophia Facialis is a very rare condition, but some forty or fifty cases have been recorded. Latterly, two very striking ones, with photographs,