_Chronic Atrophy_: In _old horses_: in right and spigelian lobes;
others show hypertrophy. In _ruminants_, omnivora and carnivora: in
areas compressed by tumors or parasites. Perihepatitis. Sclerosis.
Remedy causes if possible. _Fatty Degeneration_: Oil globules in liver
cells, pathological when they destroy the protoplasm. In ducks and
geese on forced feeding. Causes: poisoning by phosphorus, arsenic,
antimony, lead, phenol, iodoform, alcohol; excess of fat in food,
spoiled fodders, colchicum autumnale, yellow lupins, bacteria,
hemorrhages, inflammations, tumors, parasites; improved meat producing
breeds, old animals, hot stables. Lesions: liver enlarged, pale,
yellow, bloodless, knife in cutting is smeared with fat, oily stain on
paper, liver cells enlarged, protoplasm replaced by fat or oil; may be
circumscribed. Symptoms: obesity, over-fed in fats and starches, of
fattening breed, kept in confinement, in hot moist environment, if fed
certain poisons, with costiveness and indigestion, no endurance, short
winded, slight icterus, scanty urine, little urea, later, emaciation,
palpation of enlarged liver. Treatment: send to butcher, pampered
horses, cows from swill stable, a run at grass, with shade trees, a
poor pasture, salines, cholagogues, mineral acids, bitters, iron with
alkalies, currying, massage, douches.
Acute yellow atrophy has been referred to under parenchymatous hepatitis
but a chronic atrophy is also met with in all domestic animals.
In _old horses_ it affects, by preference the right and spigelian lobes,
the portal circulation of which is less direct because of the veins of
supply leaving the parent trunk at right angles (Leblanc), and because
these lobes are more exposed to compression by solid accumulations in
the double colon (Kitt). In such cases a compensatory hypertrophy of the
left and middle lobes is often observed.
In _ruminants_ the lesion is often circumscribed to the areas that have
undergone compression by tumors or parasites (echinococcus,
actinomycosis), and there may be compensatory increase elsewhere in the
organ.
In _swine_, _dogs_ and _cats_ the same conditions are operative. In all
alike perihepatitis may be a causative factor, and sclerosis
(cirrhosis), with contraction of the fibrous hyperplasia may also
operate.
_Symptoms_ are very obscure and _treatment_ unsatisfactory unless the
active causes can be recognized and arrested.