Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-dfsvx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-26T07:59:30.542Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The Enumeration of the Blood-Platelets in Mental Disorders

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 February 2018

D. K. Bruce*
Affiliation:
Storthes Hall Mental Hospital

Extract

On looking through the literature relating to the blood-picture in various types of mental disorders, one finds that most workers have confined themselves to the red and white cells only. Relatively little attention has been given to the study of the third element of the blood, namely, the blood-platelet. It is now almost universally accepted that the blood-platelet is a constant element in normal blood, and it has been shown both clinically and experimentally that in health and in disease the platelets fluctuate independently of the red and white cells. In toxic conditions there is agreement that the platelets fall in the acute stages, and that during convalescence their numbers tend to increase, after which there is a gradual fall to the normal limits. This constant behaviour of the platelets has been observed in certain acute infectious diseases, in pneumonia and in typhoid fever. Certain writers think that the platelets have an important function in eliminating foreign bodies from the blood, or play some part in establishing a state of immunity to infection. This part played by the platelets in the sterility of the blood-stream suggests an explanation for the reduced numbers in acute infections. Diminution would be due to the using-up of the platelets in removing and destroying the infective agents or their products. The present work gives the results of an attempt to show that this same relation between the platelets and toxins also exists during certain phases of mental disorder and, in these particular cases, a toxin from a focus of infection can be assumed to be the causative agent in producing the psychosis.

Type
Part I.—Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1937 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

(1) Mackay, W., Quart. Journ. of Med., No. 95, April, 1931.Google Scholar
(2) Bizzozero, J., Arch. Path. Anat., Berlin, 1882, xc, p. 261.Google Scholar
(3) Ebert, and Schimmerbusch, , Fortschrit. der Med., Berlin, 1885, iii, p. 397.Google Scholar
(4) Marino, , Compt. Rend. de la Soc. Exp. Biol. and Med., New York, 1916, xiii, p. 194.Google Scholar
(5) Downey, , Folia Hæmatol., Leipzig, 1920, xxv, p. 153.Google Scholar
(6) Schilling, V., The Blood Picture, trans. Gradwohl, R. B. H., London, 1929.Google Scholar
(7) Wright, J. H., Publ. Massachusetts Gen. Hosp., Boston, 1910, iii.Google Scholar
(8) Bunting, C. H., Johns Hopkins Bull., Baltimore, 1911, xxii, p. 114; and Minot, G. R., Journ. Exp. Med., New York, 1922, xxxvi, p. 1.Google Scholar
(9) Downey, H., Folia Hæmatol., Leipzig, 1913, xv, p. 25.Google Scholar
(10) Le Sourd, L., and Pagnez, P., Paris, 1913, lxxiv, p. 788.Google Scholar
(11) Duke, W. W., Arch. Int. Med., Chicago, 1913, xi, p. 100.Google Scholar
(12) Wright, J. H., Publ. Massachusetts Gen. Hosp., Boston, 1916.Google Scholar
(13) Moller, J. F., Comp. Rend. de la Soc. de Biol., Paris, 1922, lxxxvii, p. 759.Google Scholar
(14) Brown, Wade H., Journ. Exp. Med., New York, 1913, xviii, p. 278; and Bunting, C. H., Johns Hopkins Hosp. Bull., Baltimore, 1920, xxxi, p. 439.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(15) Pickering, J. W., The Blcod Plasma in Health and Disease, London, 1928.Google Scholar
(16) Bedson, S. P., Brit. Journ. Exp. Path., 1926, vii, p. 317.Google Scholar
(17) Kaznelson, P., Zeitschr. f. Med., Berlin, 1919, lxxxvii, p. 133.Google Scholar
(18) Mackay, W., loc. cit. Google Scholar
(19) Duke, W. W., Journ. Exp. Med., New York, 1911, xiv, p. 265.Google Scholar
(20) Cacurri, S., Lancet, 1924, ii, p. 1029.Google Scholar
(21) Leschke, E., and Wittkower, E., Zeitschr. f. klin. Med., Berlin, 1926, cii, p. 649.Google Scholar
(22) Mackay, W., loc. cit. Google Scholar
(23) Dawburn, R. Y., Easlam, F., and Evans, H.-W., Journ. of Path. and Bact., October, 1928, xxxi, p. 4833.Google Scholar
(24) Reimann, H. A., Journ. Exp. Med., 1924, xl, p. 553.Google Scholar
(25) Kemp, G. T., Colhoun, H., and Harris, C., Journ. Amer. Med. Assoc., 1906, xlvi, p. 1091.Google Scholar
(26) Duke, W. W., Arch. Int. Med., Chicago, 1912, x, p. 445.Google Scholar
(27) Bannermann, R. G., Arch. Journ. Exp. Path., 1924, v, p. 16.Google Scholar
(27a) Bedson, S. P., Journ. Path. and Bact., Ed., 1921, xxiv, p. 469.Google Scholar
(28) Duke, W. W., Amer. Journ. Med. Assoc., 1915, lxv, p. 1600.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(29) Bull, G. E., Journ. Exp. Med., New York, 1914, xx, p. 237, and 1915, xxii, pp. 456–484.Google Scholar
(30) Dalrez, and Govaerts, , Comp. Rend. de la Soc. de Biol., Paris, 1918, xxxi, p. 53; and Arch. Inter. de Physiol., v.p., 1921, xvi, and 1922, lxxxvi, p. 979.Google Scholar
(31) Dawburn, R. Y., Easlam, F., and Evans, W. H., Journ. of Path. and Bact., October, 1928, xxxi, p. 833.Google Scholar
(32) Hunter, W., Brit. Med. Journ., November 5, 1927, p. 811.Google Scholar
(33) Cotton, H. A., Journ. Ment. Sci., October, 1923, lxix, p. 434.Google Scholar
(34) Mapother, E., Brit. Med. Journ., November 13, 1926, p. 874.Google Scholar
(35) Moynihan, , ibid., November 5, 1927, p. 815.Google Scholar
(36) Graves, T. C., Journ. Ment. Sci., 1932, lxxviii, p. 322.Google Scholar
(37) Watson-Williams, P. W., ibid., p. 645.Google Scholar
(38) Clarke, T. A., ibid., p. 705.Google Scholar
(39) Henderson, D. K., Brit. Med. Journ., November 5, 1927, p. 817.Google Scholar
(40) Menzies, W. F., ibid., November 5, 1927, p. 818.Google Scholar
(41) Robertson, , Ford, W., Ther. Immun. in Asylum and General Practice, Ed., 1926, p. 17.Google Scholar
(42) Cumings, J. N., Lancet, June 10, 1933, p. 1230.Google Scholar
(43) Schilling, V., op. cit. Google Scholar
(44) Galland, and Goodall, , A Manual of Medicine, T. K. Munro, London, 1920, p. 372.Google Scholar
(45) Valentine, F. C. O., Lancet, March 7, 1936, p. 550.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.