Lafosse records certain cases of endocarditis due to extension of the disease from inflamed veins.
Prognosis. Endocarditis is always attended with great danger to life, but it is more likely to terminate in chronic valvular disease which quite unfits the animal for useful work. Mild cases may terminate in complete recovery.
Treatment. This is in the main the same as that adopted in the early stages of pericarditis. Absolute rest is of prime importance. Laxatives, sedatives and counterirritants are to be mainly relied upon. Belladonna and chloroform on the chest behind the left elbow may be used. As there is not the same danger from effusion, diuretics need not be pushed to the same extent. Digitalis must be avoided if possible until the high fever subsides. In infective cases, quinia, salicylate of soda, salol, or hyposulphite of soda may be given. Later give tincture of muriate of iron.
In rhemuatic cases, treat as for an acute attack of rheumatism. Frequent large doses of salicylate of soda or salol, large doses of acetate of potass and colchicum, warm clothing and counterirritants to the region of the heart are especially demanded. (See Rheumatism.)
When clots are suspected, and when endocarditis threatens to lapse into the chronic form, it is recommended to give iodide of potassium (horse and ox 1 drachm, dog 5 grains, twice daily) with carbonate of ammonia or of potass and bitter tonics. A lengthened rest after apparent recovery is essential to avoid permanent valve lesions.
CARDITIS. MYOCARDITIS.
Definition. Rare. Complicates pericarditis and endocarditis, wounds of the heart, and tubercular and other deposits. Symptoms. Treatment.
Definition. Inflammation of the muscular substance of the heart.
This is a rare affection and is necessarily limited to a small portion of the heart’s substance, otherwise, the cardiac contractions must cease in obedience to the general law that the normal function of an inflamed organ is for the time abolished. It is mainly seen as a concomitant of endocarditis or pericarditis, and extends only to the superficial muscular layers; or it results from a wound as in the penetration of the heart by a needle or other sharp pointed body and is then equally circumscribed. It has been seen as a complication in infectious diseases—aphthous fever, pyæmia, septicæmia, pneumonia and tuberculosis.
The evidences of the existence of carditis are chiefly the lesions met with after death. 1st, The existence of abscesses in the heart’s substance associated with polypus (Gowing, Leblanc, etc.,) or otherwise (Reynal). Also diffuse suppuration in the heart’s substance (Puze, etc.) 2nd, Softening of the muscular substance, a state occasionally met with when an animal has died of ruptured heart. 3d, Ulceration of the walls of the heart as reported by Mercier in a case of endocarditis. 4th, Transformation, and induration of the heart’s substance whether into fibrous tissue, cartilage or bone. This last condition of the walls of the right auricle and ventricle has been repeatedly seen in old horses, the change being in certain cases so extensive that one is left in wonder as to how circulation could have been carried on. Three specimens of this kind were preserved in the museum of the Alfort Veterinary College, Paris, and the Royal Veterinary College, London. Lafosse records two cases of gangrene of the internal layers of muscle in endocarditis.