Epidemic Dropsy in Calcutta

Epidemic Dropsy or Beri-Beri in Eastern Bengal *This hardly states the point of view of Lt.-Col. Giles quite fairly. Col. Giles found a vast confusion about diseases in Assam in which dropsy and anæmia were prominent symptoms. He showed clearly that these cases were not what is ordinarily known as beri-beri, and he emphasised the discovery of the share taken by the ankylostoma in producing anæmia. What was then thought to be malaria is now believed to be Leishmian-Donovah infection.—Ed., I. M. G.

of Civil Hospitals, Eastern Bengal and .Assam, were briefly to find out if there was any factor of causation common to the affected jails and not equally to the others, and I was to satisfy myself as to the diagnosis of the cases. My experience of beri-beri has been fairly extensive as I 6aw cases numbering, perhaps, five hundred, in the Tung Wah Hospital, Hong-Kong, in ioqo and 1901, through t...

Ophthalmological study of epidemic dropsy.

Although epidemic dropsy was recognised in 1877 when it appeared as an epidemic outbreak in Calcutta, it came to the attention of ophthalmologists only in 1909, when Maynard' reported the occurrence of glaucoma in cases of the disease. Epidemic dropsy is an acute toxic disease characterised initially by gastrointestinal disturbances, lowgrade fever followed by oedema of the extremities, especia...

Changing Pattern of Epidemic Dropsy in North India

Background:Epidemic dropsy occurs due to ingestion of mustard oil contaminated with oil from Argemone mexicana, leading to edema and tenderness of the abdomen, upper and lower limbs. In this study, clinical profiles of patients presented with epidemic dropsy in north India are described. Methods: This was a prospective study of patients presented with epidemic dropsy to the emergency department...

A Recurrence of Epidemic Dropsy in Calcutta in 1901

by Professor Kenneth McLeod before the Epidemiological Society of London in January 1893, and published both in their proceedings and in the Indian Medical Gazette of 1893-94, and a shorter paper by the same author is included in Clifford Allbutt's System of Medicine. In order to allow of my cases being easily compared with those of the former outbreak, it will -be well to mention the chief cha...

Further Research on Epidemic Dropsy