The neo-Hippocratic theory as basis of contemporary medical thought and practice / by A.P. Cawadias.

  • Cawadias, A. P. (Alexander Panagioti), 1884-
Date:
1928
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: The neo-Hippocratic theory as basis of contemporary medical thought and practice / by A.P. Cawadias. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    system. In the course of evolution the inductive correla¬ tive or integrative property of all cells becomes more and more concentrated in the nervous system and man, as Sherrington has demonstrated, is integrated to respond as a whole to any adequate stimulus, this integration being accomplished by the nervous system through the medium of the brain. The ancient Greek physicians insisted very much on the humoral integrative mechanism and it is true that the humors unite the organs and cells of the body as the sea unites the Islands of the Archipelago. But it must not be forgotten that the constitution of the humors depends on the functions of the various cells (endocrinic and others) and through them of the nervous system. The content in cholesterol depends' on the function of the adrenals, that of sugar on the function of the pancreas, that of calcium on the function of the parathyroid, and also, as Billigheimer has demonstrated, on that of the vegetative nervous system. In the light of recent physiological work, made for the greatest part in England, an exclusive Humoralism cannot be admitted and it must be accepted that the integrative mechanism in man is triple, Neuro-endocrino-humoral, the nervous integra¬ tion playing the preponderant role. Biologically, therefore, all parts of the body being correlated, we have to consider the whole of the body. We have to think not in terms of organs or cells or even molecules, but in terms of organism, “ Organismish ” to use the term of Rhumbler. Modern biology becomes — to use the title of a recent great German textbook a “ Biology of the Person.” The Principle of Integration of the Organism in Pathology. The body being integrated as a whole in its re-actions, disease also must be conceived in terms of integration. The whole organism becomes diseased; there are no diseases of organs, no diseases of cells or of tissues. In pathology we have to think also in terms of “ whole organism ”; the old organic pathology, the old cellular pathology have been replaced by the “ pathology of the Person ” or Syzygiology (Kraus) or “ correlations pathology ” (Ricker) or to use perhaps a better English term “ Integration pathology.” Life consists in the adaptation of the living being to its environment, in a sort of equilibrium of the internal forces towards external forces of environment. When these external environmental conditions are strongly modified and the body cannot adapt itself to this change, disease results. Disease is therefore a disharmony of life, a defect of adaptation, an irresponsivity as Grote puts it to external conditions. But even in the period