STUDIES OF EXOPHTHALMIC GOITER AND THE INVOLUNTARY NERVOUS SYSTEM

Abstract

All observers have noticed a mutual interrelationship between the critical epochs in the sex life of the female and disturbances in the thyroid gland and the involuntary nervous system. It is our purpose to record our clinical observations in this regard, following a study of more than six years in the thyroid department of the Mount Sinai Hospital. SUMMARY OF LITERATURE ON MORPHOLOGIC AND FUNCTIONAL CHANGES IN THYROID GLAND Alterations in the morphology of the thyroid gland have been clearly delineated by Marine.¹He has defined the normal gland and has shown that with iodide-lack there occurs a hyperplasia associated with vascular congestion, which may lead to a visible and palpable swelling of the gland. On the administration of iodine,²the gland involutes and becomes colloidal. This is accompanied by a decrease in size. A colloidal gland is therefore a gland which has once been hyperplastic, and which,