Impaired innervation of bulbar nerves. Paresis of lips, tongue, and
larynx. Roaring. Rapid pulse. Glycosuria, albuminuria. Ptosis.
Twitching eyelids. Dysphagia. Paralysis. Treatment, rest, cold to
head, laxatives, nerve stimulants, tonics, electricity.
The bulb is intimately connected with the origin of the hypoglossal,
glosso-pharyngeal, spinal accessory, vagus, facial, and trifacial nerves
and active disease in the bulb is therefore likely to entail impairment
of the function of several of these nerves. In man this is recognized in
_chronic progressive bulbar paralysis_, which almost always affects the
lips, tongue and larynx advancing steadily though slowly to a fatal
termination. In degenerative lesions there is modified voice, difficulty
of swallowing, rapid pulse, and laryngeal paralysis (especially of the
arytenoid muscles). The implication of the root of the vagus may be
inferred from the arrest of inhibition of the heart, and from glycosuria
or albuminuria. Occasionally the ocular and palpebral muscles are
involved causing ptosis, or twitching of the muscles. When the facial
(7th) nerve is implicated, paralysis of one or both sides of the face
may be marked, including often the ears. When the glosso-pharyngeal, the
difficulty of swallowing is a prominent feature, and when the spinal
accessory, spasm or paralysis of the neck. In the worst cases death
supervenes early, by reason of interference with the respiratory and
cardiac functions.
The _treatment_ of these affections is usually very unsatisfactory,
though in meat producing animals it may sometimes be desirable to
preserve them in preparation for the butcher. Rest, in hyperæmic cases,
cold to the head and purgatives, and in those in which fever is absent,
small doses of nerve stimulants (strychnia) and tonics (phosphorus,
phosphates, ammonia-sulphate of copper, zinc sulphate, silver nitrate)
may be tried. A course of arsenic and carefully regulated electrical
stimuli may at times give good results.