Causes; debilitating, climatic, microbian. Symptoms; fever, dullness;
lies under litter; ears and tail droop; watery eyes; anorexia;
vomiting; pharyngeal swelling; buccal redness and fœtor; tonsils
swollen with pus or caseous mass in follicles; cough dry and hard,
later loose. Abscess. Calculus. Course. Treatment; antiseptic
electuaries; embrocations; laxatives; diuretics; tonics.
This is seen in both the acute and chronic form. In the former it has
the general causes and symptoms of pharyngitis. There is more or less
fever, dullness, a disposition to lie with head extended and buried in
the litter, ears drooping, eyes watering and red, carelessness of food,
deglutition painful, and liable to be followed by vomiting. The mouth is
red and hot, the breath fœtid and the tonsils swollen, and their alveoli
filled with muco purulent matter or at times with a fœtid cheese-like
product. The cough is at first dry and hard and later loose and
gurgling.
In the chronic form there is general swelling of the tonsils with the
overdistension of the follicles by the above mentioned whitish
putty-like masses, which are often even calcareous. These are due to the
proliferation of microbes which find in these alveoli a most favorable
field for their propagation. A similar condition is found in the
carnivora and to a less extent in the horse, in keeping with the
restricted development of the amygdalæ in these animals. It may be
attended by ulceration, or in rare cases by the formation of veritable
calculi in the follicles of the tonsils.
The gravity of the disease is largely determined by the nature of the
infecting microbe and the debility and susceptibility of the animal
attacked. The affection usually ends in recovery, but may go on to grave
local ulceration, and general infection.
_Treatment_ consists largely in astringent and antiseptic applications
to the buccal mucous membrane. In the acute forms frequent smearing of
the mouth with electuaries of honey or molasses and borax, boric acid,
salammoniac, chlorate or permanganate of potash, and the application of
stimulating embrocations to the skin around the throat. In other cases
solutions of tincture of chloride of iron, or of tincture of iodine can
be used with profit. The iron can be swallowed with advantage, but it is
objectionable to pour liquid rapidly into the mouth of the pig, because
of the danger of its entering the lungs and setting up fatal pneumonia.
A better way is to apply it to the interior of the mouth and fauces on a
swab or sponge dipped in the liquid. Short of this one of these agents
may be mixed with the drinking water, or muriatic acid may be used in
the same way, though at some detriment to the teeth. The general health
must at all times be attended to. Any costiveness may be corrected by
Glauber salts or jalap, and elimination through the kidneys must be
sought through the use of nitrate of potash or other diuretic.