The distribution of blood in shock

Abstract

An effort has been made to determine the percentage of blood in different organs before and after shock. About fifteen animals (dogs) have been used so far. Under Grehant's anesthetic, the arterial blood pressure was determined. Then, under conditions of high blood pressure, certain organs, or parts of organs, were suddenly ligatured or clamped off from the circulation, and then removed with their blood content. The animal was then allowed to go gradually into a state of “shock” (for our purposes, indicated by a low pressure) or was rapidly reduced to that state by concussion or burning. Then companion organs or parts were similarly clamped off and excised. The organs were weighed, cut up into fine pieces and extracted, the blood content being determined by Welcker's method. In taking the abdominal organs, we usually proceeded in the following order: (1) a small loop of intestine clamped off or ligatured suddenly, avoiding large arteries and veins; (2) a portion of one lobe of the liver, using a large clamp suddenly applied; (3) one pole of the spleen, (4) one kidney. After “shock” the same order was followed. So far, in most of our work the same animal has served for “before” and “after” determinations. This perhaps introduces doubt as to the condition of abdominal organs if shock were produced before opening the abdomen. We shall extend the experiments with variations as soon as a large series of “before” percentages is available for averaging.