Prognosis. Bernardin says that if hæmaturia is present nine out of ten cases are fatal, while in the absence of this feature nine-tenths recover.
Lesions. The jaundiced appearance of the conjunctiva and other tissues is constant. The heart is pale, soft and flaccid, with petechial patches of a deep red extending into the muscular substance; the lungs are congested with similar patches of blood-staining; the blood in the heart and larger vessels is dark, and fluid or only loosely clotted. The liver is congested to twice or thrice its normal size (10 lbs. in place of 3 or 4 lbs.); the spleen is enlarged, softened, and shows spots of brownish yellow. The small intestine contains a yellowish or dark red meconium, and it may contain effusions of dark blood, while its mucosa is inflamed, thickened, easily lacerated, and pigmented, or marked by petechiæ. The large intestines and especially the rectum are packed with hard dry balls.
The kidneys are enlarged, often to double their volume, and deeply congested, with infarcts, and patches of necrosis, of a pale brownish yellow hue. The urine in the bladder is deeply stained with blood coloring matter.
Treatment. For congenital cases it is manifest that treatment must be preventive and applied to the dam, before parturition. An open air life, moderate exercise, sound, easily digestible and nourishing food; grooming; in the stable, cleanliness, dryness and good ventilation; good water, are essential.
For the offspring, antiseptics (tannin, mercuric chloride lotion, copperas, calomel, iodoform), applied to the navel, and protection against cold winds and rains, and damp lairs. For mules and other young animals born in severe, winter weather a dry, warm, foaling box is desirable, and the little animal should be rubbed dry and covered with a warm woolen blanket. When the temperature approaches zero or the barn is cold, the smaller animals, as soon as they are dropped, should be placed under a box with a jar of hot water wrapped in woolen coverings, or with hot bricks similarly wrapped, and should only be let out for food when they are completely dried, or when the weather has moderated.
Therapeutic treatment may be commenced by a dose of aloes given to the dam, or of olive or castor oil or manna given to the offspring. As a substitute sulphate of soda may be used. Antiseptics like salicylate of soda, salol, or the sulphites may be added. To act as a demulcent on the alimentary and urinary tracts, well boiled flaxseed tea is usually recommended. Weakness may be met by warm strong coffee, salicin, quinia, or other bitters, and more stimulating agents like camphor, angelica, assafœtida, or even oil of turpentine may be added. Diarrhœa may be checked by linseed tea, mustard plasters, or in obstinate cases, by opium. Elimination should be sought by administering abundance of pure water or watery demulcents, and even by the use of alkalies like bicarbonates of soda or potash. A moderately free action of the bowels must be constantly maintained.
Antiseptic treatment of the navel and umbilical veins must not be overlooked.
LUPINOSIS, ACUTE TOXÆMIC ICTERUS, ACUTE YELLOW ATROPHY OF THE LIVER.
Attacks sheep, goat, ox, horse, stag; and, experimentally, dog. Causes: consumption of lupins, at a given stage of ripeness, from a given part of a field, or from centre of a stack. Lupinotoxine, conicine, methyl conicine, lupinine. Cryptogamic or bacterial poison. Weak subjects, sheep and even ewes and lambs, suffer most. Symptoms: Acute form: anorexia, fever, excited pulse and breathing, stupor, or hyperæsthesia, vertigo, swellings on head. Poisonous lupins are first rejected. Bloody nasal froth. In two or three days icterus. Urine may be bloody. Fæces at first hard, coated, bloody, later dark brown and often liquid. Emaciation. Death in 1 to 5 days. Chronic form, gastro-enteritis, emaciation, anæmia. Nasal catarrh. Facial swellings and sores. Lesions: hepatitis, nephritis, muco-enteritis, enlarged spleen, icterus, blood extravasations; hepatic tissue, infiltrated, cloudy, granular, fatty, later cirrhosis. Kidneys contain casts: Spleen tumid, blood gorged. Prognosis: grave: acute cases die, chronic may recover. Prevention: feed no lupins, avoid dangerous fields, wash off poison from lupins with a soda solution. Ensilage with acid producing fodder in alternate layers. Treatment: avoid alkalies, give acids, purgative, castor oil, water. In horse, causes anorexia, anæsthesia, dullness, stupor, colic, constipation, urinary irritation, fever, slight jaundice, vertigo, orange nasal discharge, sores on tongue and face, and lower part of limbs. Diagnosis. Prognosis hopeful. Treatment as in sheep. Icterus from other fodders.
This affection has been noticed especially in sheep, but also in the goat, horse, ox and stag as the result of eating lupins. The dog has contracted the disease under experiment. It has been studied especially in Northern Germany where the lupin is largely cultivated as a fodder crop. The yellow lupin (Lupinus Luteus) is mainly to blame for the disease, but the Lupinus Albus and Augustifolius are also spoken of as factors.