SENSIBILITY OF THE EXPOSED HUMAN HEART AND PERICARDIUM

Abstract

Knowledge of cardiac and pericardial sensibility, as we have found it presented in published reports, is meager and incomplete. There is little agreement among the reporters as to the facts. This is largely due, we believe, to the scarcity of opportunity for careful observation on the open pericardial cavity of patients who are neither narcotized, shocked nor very toxic. We recently availed ourselves of an unusual opportunity to investigate extensively the sensory reactions of the exposed human heart and pericardium to various forms of stimulation. REPORT OF CASE Our patient was a telephone linesman, aged 30, who was admitted to the University Hospital on Feb. 2, 1929, with typical history, symptoms and signs of a basal lobar pneumonia of the left lung of three days' duration. During the next twelve days the signs and symptoms of the disease subsided, but on the following day there were a sharp rise in