Evolution and disease (1890) (14577445038)

Identifier: evolutiondisease00blan (find matches)
Title: Evolution and disease
Year: 1890 (1890s)
Authors: Bland-Sutton, John, Sir, 1855-1936
Subjects: Diseases Medical genetics Abnormalities, Human Animals Disease Congenital Abnormalities
Publisher: New York : Scribner & Welford
Contributing Library: Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine
Digitizing Sponsor: Open Knowledge Commons and Harvard Medical School



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of such a long recognized disease as cretinism.All visitors to Switzerland, the Rhone and Aosta valleys,are familiar with what is termed endemic goitre andendemic cretinism. The leading features of cretinismare briefly these:—The disease is congenital, and dis-plays itself in unnatural shortness of the trunk andlimbs, malformations of the skull (as a rule it is unusuallysmall), and idiocy, combined with abnormal conditionsof the thyroid body. Cretins, as those affected withthis disease are called, present a characteristic appear-ance ; a typical cretin is represented in fig. 126, takenfrom the admirable report, compiled by a Commission,created by the King of Sardinia, to inquire into this 260 EVOLUTION AND DISEASE. disease, published at Turin, 1848. The boy is describedas being twenty years old, is one metre in height; he isdeaf and dumb, not comprehending any sign, and spendshis time in turning the small baton between his fingers ;the intellectual faculties are practically wanting.
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Fig. 126.—An endemic Cretin twenty years old: one metrehigh. (From the Sardinian Report.) Until recently it was little thought that cretinism occurs in our country, although it was known that goitre is endemic in certain districts. In 1871 Dr. Hilton Fagge x clearly showed that cretins occurred in England 1 Medico-Chir. Trans., 1871. ZOOLOGICAL DISTRIBUTION OF DISEASE. 261 by publishing descriptions of undoubted examples. Oneof Fagges specimens is drawn in fig. 127, for compari-son with the endemic cretin on the opposite page. Thisboy is sixteen years and a half old, rather less thana metre in height, and could understand a good dealof what was said to him, ask for what he wanted, andthe parents could understand what he said.