Definition. Causes, lack of plasticity of the blood, thin walls, blood
tension, cardiac erethism, hypertrophy and neurosis. Sex. Heredity
through the female. Treatment, depletive, styptic, astringent.
Transfusion.
This is a constitutional infirmity, usually hereditary and characterized
by the occurrence of profuse and continuous bleeding as the result of
otherwise insignificant injuries or even apart from any recognizable
lesion. It has been attributed to a slow coagulation of the blood, but
at the start of a hæmorrhage the blood is rich in corpuscles and
coagulates firmly. It has also been ascribed to extreme tenuity of the
vascular walls, but this has only been met with in a certain proportion
of the cases. Another potent factor is a permanent over-filling of the
bloodvessels (Immermann, Delafield, Prudden). The same writers attach
importance to cardiac erethism, cardiac hypertrophy, and certain
neurotic influences which temporarily increase the habitually congestive
diathesis. In man the majority of victims have been males, perhaps
because most subject to traumatisms. On the contrary the hereditary
transmission is mainly through the female members of the family. The
families are very prolific, a condition counterbalanced by the death of
the majority of the victims at an early age. Among the lower animals it
has been observed in horses consequent on castration (Siedamgrotzky,
Kohne, Friedberger and Fröhner), setoning (Kohne, Dieckerhoff), and an
ulcer of the leg (Kohne).
_Treatment_ consists in combating plethora and constipation by saline
purgatives. The subject should be carefully protected from injuries.
Locally use styptics such as matico, muriate of iron, tannin, alum with
pressure. Internally ergot, lead acetate, iron chloride, tannin, alum,
or muriate acids. Transfusion is a dernier resort.