The infant : a handbook of modern treatment / by Eric Pritchard.

  • Pritchard, Eric, 1864-1943.
Date:
1938
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The infant : a handbook of modern treatment / by Eric Pritchard. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    524/774 (page 498)
    reputations in the treatment of other forms of the affection : \ to 1 minim of (1 in 1000) solution of adrenalin, should be injected hypodermically at the earliest possible opportunity. Usually within a few minutes the oedema will commence to subside and will have disappeared in the course of a few hours. Eczema As far as children under 5 years of age are concerned eczema generally takes the so-called “ infantile ” form (Eczema Infantum), and this variety, if not all others, is now commonly included among the “ allergic ” skin diseases. Although more often than not it is the result of an extension of some pre-existing dermatitis, especially seborrhoea of the scalp, or papular urticaria, as a rule it only develops in specially susceptible infants of the allergic type. Eczema infantum is now usually regarded as due to external irritation of the skin, occurring in children who are particularly susceptible to all forms of stimulation. In support of this view most infants liable to eczema also show evidence of the irritability of their integuments by the development of dermographic phe¬ nomena on very slight provocation, such as drawing the nail across the skin, and a liability to contract sores in the folds of the skin and behind the ears where moisture, and especially soapy water, is apt to accumulate, and whence it is difficult to remove. Eczema of this kind nearly always commences in the parts which are exposed to the greatest degree of irritation, namely, the scalp, forehead, face, behind the ears, and in the folds of the skin, and having once started in these situations it is extremely liable to extend owing to scratching or secondary infection. From the point of view of treatment, both prophylactic and curative, an understanding of the etiological factors concerned in the production of eczema is of basic importance, and for this reason the pathogenesis of the condition should be reviewed in all its aspects. In the first place hypersensitiveness of the skin to all forms of external or internal irritation must be taken as the basis of the pathology. This sensitiveness of the skin may be inborn and hereditary, or acquired as a result of sensitization to special allergens, or indeed, it may result from these two factors combined. Hypersensitiveness of the skin is however only an expression of the hypersensibility of the nerve cell which is the dominant factor in the reflex act. These exaggerated dermato¬ logical reactions in eczema are due rather to the susceptibility of the nerve cells than to any particular vulnerability on the part of the skin itself. The degree of excitability of the whole of the central nervous sphere as well as that of all its component cells,