Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-17
APPENDICITIS CAUSE
DREADED DISEASE PRIMARILY
DUE TO INDIGESTION.
frequently Results From insufficient
Time Devoted to Meals-Knows
No Age or Rank.
From the London National Review.

The recent Huxley lecture delivered by
Sir William Macewen has once again
| raised the oft-recurring question so pain
full to the public: why is appendicitis so
common at the present time?" This Attic
ton spares neither age nor sex, and it Is
equally dreaded in palace and cottage. The
king has been found among its victims, nor
has it neglected the ptiable vagrant on the
embankment. An infant OF seven weeks
has recently succumbed to the baneful in
fammatory process. while medical bar
onet long past the allotted span of three
score years and ten has happily fought
successful fight against appendicitis. The
idle girl. without definite employment, sue
cumbs, as also does the soldier on active
service. The schoolboy is particularly prone.
and the affection does not ignore the high
dignitary of the church. Can 1t be that
the small blind tube placed within the
abdomen has suddenly become vulnerable
to assault, or is it that there is some pecu-
liarly potent force now at work which did
not formerly exist? It is not to be denied
that more accurate diagnosis has led to
apparent increase in the number of
cases of the complaint. Pertonitis, or in
fiammation of the lining membrane of the.
abdomen, has always been a common and a
dreaded malady. but the precise cause of
the inflammation has frequently been en-
tirely overlooked in the past and today it
is the opinion of most medical practitioners
that considerably more than one-half of
the cases of peritonitis are primarily at
tributable to an Inflammation of the vermi-
form appendix. 1t is such an everyday oc
currence that we almost wonder not why
our closest friend has been struck down,
but when our turn may come.
Cherry Stone Fiction.
1t may not be- therefore, altogether with
out interest to review some of the known
causes of appendicitis, and see how they
may be avoided. Although this is strictly
a professional subject. yet to be forewarn-
ed is to be forearmed and this must be
the excuse for discussing 1t. Some people
would still seem to cherish the idea that
fruit stones and pips of all sizes, from the
cherry stone to the small apple pip are IL
able to enter the cavity of the appendix
and there cause dire havoc. AS regards the
| cherry stone this is pure fiction, and the
sooner it is disposed of the better. When
| the reader realizes that the entrance of
| the tube, which has larger diameter than
| any other part will hardly admit In the
normal state the top of an uncut cedar
pencil it will readily be seen that even a
| modera te-sized cherry stone would have
| some difficulty in passing in. That smaller
| foreign bodies may gain access to the in
| terror of the tube is undoubtedly true, but
\ the number of instances in which such have
| actually been discovered within the dis
| eased appendix is comparatively small. A
| single DUCK SnOt, Il SIllall VI SUI
| der from canned meat tin, bristle from
| a tooth brush, spicule from the lining OF
| an enameled saucepan and an ordinary pin
| have all been known to find their way into
| the interior of the appendix, and once there
such bodies may undoubtedly induce in
| fiammation in the manner subsequently de-
| scribed. While. then, admitting that in a
| few cases extraneous matters of the char
acter and size mentioned may play some
| part in the incidence of appendicitis. we
| must seek more common cause for the
| frequency of the Affection.
Organisms.
| The human body is constantly harboring
| Heterogeneous, which ever ready to
attack the tissues, and are especially capa-
BILE of doing so whenever the person is be-
| low par. or the particular tissue with which
| they are in contact has suffered some in
| jury. These heterogeneous, styled bac-
terra, are constantly taken in with food.
and more particularly so in towns. Being
| thus perpetually reinforced, they con-
| tinually multiplying. and able to attack
| any undefended point. There is perhaps,
nothing which so tends to assist their null
| DUPLICATION and TO increase their virulence
| as hurried and irregular meals involving
| the retention of imperfectly digested food.
| Then it is that these microscopical organ
| isms will crowd into what may be called
| the backwater of the appendix, here to
| stagnate and to develop a powerful poison,
| which. acting upon the walls of the tube,
| soon produces Inflammation. which Is evil
denced by pain and all the train of symp-
| toms incident TO appendicitis. Take a day
| in the life of the ordinary city man, who,
| having risen somewhat later than usual,
| finds it necessary to hurry his breakfast,
perhaps even to run part of the way to the
| station. or in order to catch the train which
| will enable him to keep an important APP
| pointment. He is busy throughout the
| morning and finds that to get through his
| work and enable him to leave his office at
| a respectable hour in the afternoon lunch
con must be scramble. though he is I'M
willing to forego his usual full complement
| of diverse food. On reaching home he is
| too tired to enjoy any healthy exercise, and
| a third meal, ie.. dinner, follows upon the
| two previous badly digested meals he has
| already taken, with the result that the in
| eyftable evil consequences follow. He may
| keep up this unwholesome rush for while,
| but before long he will feel the necessity
! for a holiday. off he goes, and perhaps
| opens the ball with tough round of golf,
| or possibly a series of hard sets at lawn
| tennis, or maybe even days sculiing
| Then he Is suddenly attacked with appendl-
| citis and placed in considerable danger.
The moral is to eat ones meals DELHI
erately leaving time for the commencement
| of the process of digestion before imposing
| undue strain on the muscles by rushing to
| the station. or the mental faculties by any
| intellectual effort such as a smart financial
| nfip