INDIGESTION, INTESTINAL GAS, AND OTHER MATTERS.
We noted the fact that the "digestive secretions" in a man weighing 140
pounds amount to twenty-three pounds in twenty-four hours; now add to
these the food and liquids taken in that period, and you will form some
estimate of the work done in the human chemical laboratory in its
normal and abnormal states.
We noted further that substances confined too long in receptacles
decompose and generate pathogenic poisons, that is, poisons productive
of disease; and that the intestinal reservoirs are no exception to this
law of putrefactive changes. How could we avoid drawing the inference,
therefore, that disease-breeding germs, (generated in the organism and
hence called "autogenetic"), and their auto-infection, _i.e._,
absorption by the system, are an inevitable consequence of the undue
retention and fermentation of the contents of these reservoirs: a
consequence, in other words, of that intestinal uncleanliness commonly
called biliousness, constipation, indigestion.
By far the most common and immediate source of autogenetic
(self-produced) poisons and their auto-infection, is some degree of
chronic constipation and the deadening, smothering effects of
constipation on digestion; an effect analogous to what takes place when
we allow waste material or ashes to bank up against a fire, shutting
off its draft. Does the fire then continue to digest the coal? Clog up
the receptacle for ashes and the coal grows cold. Dam up the colon or
sigmoid and digestion is disturbed, diminished and debased, as
evidenced by the local and general discomfort, and later by the train
of inevitable disorders.
Indigestion is a household word. It has the widest range of all the
diseases, because it forms a part of almost every other; and some
diseases, such as chronic catarrh and pulmonary consumption, are in
many cases produced by indigestion; which in turn had its source in
chronic constipation caused by injury or inflammation of the lower
bowel, as explained in our first chapter.
Diminished nutrition, impoverished blood, and loss of weight of from
ten to twenty-five pounds, are the signs that indicate the coming
disaster to the sufferer from auto-intoxication: the thoroughly
poisoned state of the system resulting from auto-infection.
Vessels used by the dairyman and by those who furnish us with food
products and liquids are kept scrupulously clean. Why? Because it is a
question of loss of trade--of money. Should these vessels be used when
foul from fermentation or putrefaction of their contents, Wealth would
flee from the coffers of our purveyors, and the Boards of Health would,
or rather should, take a hand in the matter. And these same purveyors,
by the way, why do they care more for Wealth than for Health, their own
and ours? But why are we all of us so neglectful of Inner cleanliness
and so careful of Outer? The receptacles of the inner man reek with
augean filth, and we cleanse them not. The immortal fountains of Health
and Happiness are dammed, blasted and degraded by just this neglect of
our imperative duty; the duty of furnishing full opportunity for the
functions of replenishment and life, _by keeping the sewer passages
clear_.
Are a sour stomach and foul intestinal canal fit receptacles for food
and liquids? When our receptacles are in this condition, why do we add
more material for the generation of poisons of the ptomain and
leucomain classes, and morbid gaseous elements? It has been
demonstrated that during fermentation an apple will evolve a volume of
gas six hundred times its own size. What folly then to add to the
fermenting mass! Food taken under such conditions will produce results
not hard to imagine.
The gases that are commonly found in the stomach and small intestines
are carbonic acid, nitrogen, oxygen and hydrogen; while, besides all
these, sulphureted and carbureted hydrogen are found in the large
intestine, causing in a normal state the necessary and useful
distention of the alimentary canal. The writer has long regarded the
abnormal production of gaseous substances in the intestinal canal from
putrefactive changes as of itself not only a grave menace to health,
but as a condition productive of morbific results of which we have
still much to learn. The more or less constant and excessive distention
of the whole or even of a part of the intestinal canal by gases is a
serious condition, affecting as it does the various organs of the body,
not only through the absorption of these gases into the general
circulation but also through the reflex nervous reaction of these
organs. It is astonishing what amount of mechanical force is exerted by
the gases in the intestinal canal. They distend not only the muscular
walls of the intestines and stomach but the strong abdominal walls as
well, until the clothing worn has to be loosened for ease and comfort.
This more or less extreme mechanical pressure may account for many
cases of hernia, prolapse of the uterus, dislocation of various organs,
disturbance of the circulation of the blood, and interference with the
function of the nervous system, as indicated by its many protests in
the way of aches and pains. Naval-constructor Hobson has lately
demonstrated the dynamic power of gas confined in bags or receptacles
in raising battleships; and it still remains for some physiologist or
pathologist to demonstrate the morbid dynamic results of gases confined
in the alimentary apparatus. The deleterious effect of the abnormal
quantity of gases on all the organs of the body is imperfectly
understood at present, but will be better apprehended when we are able
to study more minutely the pathogenic poisons of the human system. It
is known, however, that a stream of carbonic acid gas, or even of
hydrogen, will paralyze a muscle against which it is directed.