LIGHT ON SHELL SHOCK

Greymouth Evening Star, 30 October 1918, Page 8

LIGHT ON SHELL SHOCK

EFFECT ON BRAIN CELLS.

ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE OF

SHELLS

toheii-shocik is u thing that came upon u world unprepared. Days and nights of uninterrupted death, smattering- explosions, mud and water and Hunger and sleeplessness—all the concomitants of modern lighting—have caused this peculiar lapse of brain and nerves wiiich for want of a better name : s called shellshock. Victims of it were first put in asylums for the insane in England, until it wasi discovered that their symptoms were not of the usual recognisable kind. Only recently have scientists been able to of the fundamental effects of the displacement of quantities of air, the brain lesions that result from tremendous explosions in the atmosphere-. M. Allen Starr, emeritus professor of neurology, writes illuminatingly of the subject in “Scribner’s Magazine”:

“In a number of fatal cases recorded bv F. W. Mott, small hemorrhages, microscopic in size,' hundreds in number, have been found scattered irregularly through the brain. These destroy not only nerve cells, but also the nerve fibres, which cany the messages .from cell to cell and enable the processes of association of ideas and memories to go on in the mind. The mechanism of thinking is in this way completely thrown out of gear.. Such little clots may in time during life be absorbed, like the bemmorhage caused by a. bruise, so that their existence is not necessarily fatal and does not permanently incapacitate the individual.

EXAMPLES IN ANIMALS, Mu other eases changes in the cells or the brain are produced, wnich a,re Known to follow continued emotional strain or long-continued sleeplessness in animals- if a rabbit is kept awake for 100 hours it dies of exhaustion, in spite of feeding. If a rat Us frightened to death it shows the same brain condition found in the rabbit- These changes in brain conditions found in the rabbit are characteristic of exhaustion- The brain cell, like a, grape, has a skin and an internal framework filled in with gelatinous material. When it is put to work this material is used up, until at last the framework and skin are empty, like a dried raisin. If the work ceases while a. little gelatine remains, Nature may provide a new supply through the blood and fill the skin again. But if the substance. is all used up no regeneration is possible. Now, under emotional strain ,or sleeplessness or exhaustion the same changes occur that we see after work, and hence we believe that as a basis of shell-shock m some cases there is a. state of disintegration in the brain cells of greater or less degree. “There is still another explanation, which happily applies to very many of the cases. If one receives a sudden blow upon the head 01 state known asi concussion results, in which for a. time all the faculties are suspended. But later on they return, and the effect passes off. It seems as if fear would cans© a sort of mental concussion. Now if one regards mental activity as dependent on the flow of thought, or the play of consciousness, along the thousands of nerve fibres within the brain, and if mental shook suspends

for a time the passage of those nerve impulses, we can readily imagine a suspension of nerve action which is temporary, and not clue to actual disease. Many regard these nerve impulses as electrical in nature, and we may imagine * ■ grounding of the nerves or the arrest of conductivity such as puts our telephones out in a thunderstorm. Then orderly thought, clear, conscious perception, voluntary activity may be suspended for a time —but return when the storm is over. These are analogies only, but they help one to picture the state, of mind and the brain in shell-shock. 1

TEN TONS TO THE SQUARE YARD.

“It has been known for a. longtime that "Sudden changes m atmospheric pressure produce startling effects' upon the nervous system, through tne blood. Just as the removal of the cork from the bottle of champagne sets free bubbles of gas in the lluid, so the sudden removal of atmospheric pressure from the body sets free bubbles of gas in the blood; and these, by acting as plugs in the finer vessels, cut off the brain supply and thus derange their action. Now it has been shown that the explosion of large shells causes an atmospheric pressure of 10 tons to the square yard on bodies within 50ft., and this is succeeded at once by a corresponding decrease ..of pressure. Thus the secondary effect of the explosion of a. shell isi to cause gases to form in the blood which may paralyse or even kill. This is the explanation of deaths in the trenches without evidence of external injury, and is also accepted a.s the underlying cause of some cases of shell-shock.”