The Medical Clinics of North America Volume 3, Nos. 4-6

Book excerpt: This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1920 edition. Excerpt: ...to starvation it was decided to take the child on a forty-eight-hour auto trip, so that he would not see any food except his broth and orange-juice; 6 ounces of broth were given every three hours and a tablespoonful of orange-juice night and morning. The amusement afiorded by the trip, together with the fact that the child neither saw nor smelled food other than his own, served to lighten the task of diet restriction. At the end of the second twenty-four-hour period the urine amounted to 500 c.c. and upon examination showed no sugar, diatetic acid, or acetone; the child was apparently none the worse for the starvation. His weight was pound less than before the fast was begun. According to various observers a. child at the age of two years requires approximately 80 calories for each kilogram of weight during a twenty-four-hour period, and an attempt was made to provide a diet for this child that would keep the urine sugar, diacetic acid, and acetone free, and provide the largest number of calories. During the third twenty-four-hour period the determination of carbohydrate tolerance was begun by the feeding of 5 per cent. vegetables in the form of cabbage, spinach, and lettuce leaves. The child was less irritable, yet the task of restricting the diet was a most diflicult one. The vegetables were thrice boiled, thereby lessening the amount of carbohydrate taken and increasing the bulk. The danger of causing gastro-intestinal disturbances was lessened by passing the vegetables through a flour sieve, and no intestinal upset was encountered; 150 grams of 5 per cent. vegetables, when thrice boiled, were calculated as having but 3 per cent. of carbohydrate or 5 grams of carbohydate, and each day 5 grams of carbohydrate were added until sugar...