Date of Award

1925

Document Type

Thesis - Restricted

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Medical

Abstract

A detailed study of operative specimens of the prostate gland affected with enlargement was undertaken in an endeavor to determine more precisely the nature of the histological changes. These changes make their appearance in about one out of every three men as age advances. The problem of the work consists in an attempt to accurately describe and classify the changes that occur in the varied tis­ sues which constitute the prostate gland. Toward this end each specimen was examined microscopically, after being treated with a series of differential tissue stains and examined as well with the polariscope. One has but to ac­ quaint himself with the nomenclature of this disease condition and the chaos of ideas regarding its structure is at once apparent. The term prostatic hypertrophy to designate benign enlargement is the most commonly used; but this is a misnomer as it is not mere hypertrophy, compensatory or otherwise. The arrangement and type of tissue differs mat­erially from hypertrophy. Spitzer has suggested the name adenomatosis, but while this would aptly apply to some cases, it would not be descriptive of others in which there is present proliferation of fibrous and muscular tissue and inflammatory swelling, as well as increase in the glandular element. Again, there are a surprisingly large number of these glands considered benign after clinical examination, which are later discovered on histological examination to be undergoing carcinomatous changes as attested by the reports of Young, Albarran, and Platou, in which the incidence of carcinoma ranged from twenty-two to twenty-five percent. So here is a field of investigation, attractive because of its present state of perplexity and offering an opportunity to clarify an ill-defined pathological entity.

The work was carried out during the school year from September 1924 to June 1925 in the pathological laboratory of Marquette University School of Medicine under the dir­ection of Professor Edward L. Miloelavich.

Download

Share

COinS

Restricted Access Item

Having trouble?