In gastric indigestion and gastritis vomiting is always present, but in these cases it does not take place until some time after feeding, perhaps several hours. In gastritis the vomiting is more constant. In the more severe cases there will be not only the partially digested food but also bile and mucus and sometimes traces of blood.
Obstructive vomiting is sometimes found among infants and may be due to intestinal obstruction or to an obstruction of the pyloris. The obstruction may be congenital or it may develop after birth. Obstruction of the pyloris may be the result of hypertrophic stenosis. In this condition the child vomits immediately following feeding and with great force. This is thoroughly described in the article on Hypertrophic Stenosis of the Pylorus. If the obstruction is in the intestinal tract it may be the result of a congenital malformation or due to intussusception. The vomiting is forceful and the vomitus may contain fecal matter.
Vomiting is often associated with peritonitis and appendicitis. In these conditions there is distention of the abdomen with abdominal pains which may be localized. There may also be a slight temperature. Vomiting is purely adaptative on the part of Innate Intelligence. The food cannot be digested and carried through the digestive tract so Innate realizes that the best thing to do is to free the body from it in the quickest manner.
Vomiting often precedes such incoördinations as pneumonia, scarlet fever and malaria and may precede any of the febrile dis-eases. Vomiting may be produced by the accumulation and absorption of toxines in the body.
Infants suffering with nervous disorders such as acute meningitis, tumors of the brain and other central conditions will often have cerebral vomiting. In this event the vomiting is spontaneous and does not necessarily occur at feeding time. Other cerebral symptoms present will aid in determining the analysis.
Vomiting may be produced by the presence of worms that come up into the throat from the stomach and intestinal tract. Hunger may occasionally bring on an attack of vomiting. This is more common in older children than in infants.
RECURRENT VOMITING
This is also known as cyclic vomiting and periodical vomiting. It is characterized by recurrent attacks which may be weeks or months apart. They come on without any apparent cause and from the descriptions and explanations given in medical science very little can be done medically to control the vomiting which at the end of two or three days will cease spontaneously. The attacks recur at different intervals, usually less often, gradually decreasing until they cease altogether when the patient is about the age of ten or twelve years.
Symptoms
There is loss of appetite and malaise. The pulse becomes rapid and in some cases there is slight temperature. There is usually headache and excessive thirst. During the attack of vomiting there is extreme retching and great distress. The symptoms are similar to migraine in adults. This condition must be differentiated from tubercular meningitis in which there is vomiting without apparent cause. The course of the symptoms will soon enable a positive differentiation. In acute indigestion there is vomiting, but the history of the case reveals the fact that the attack was brought on by undigested food. It is very easy to distinguish this type of vomiting from that of appendicitis, since in appendicitis there is marked tenderness at McBurney’s point, also pain and the characteristic rigidity and muscular contraction. In intussusception the symptoms are usually more severe and there is blood and mucus in the stool.