Volume 66 · Issue 01 · 1948

Sebrell in 1938 (1) first suspected that pellagra might be a manifestation of multiple deficiency in which ribofiavin might play a role. Experiments carried out by him and Butler in the same year showed that diets low in riboflavin content would produce a clinical syndrome, which we now know to be characteristic of ribofiaviri deficiency. The work of these authors was later confirmed by workers in all parts of the world. Spies (2), Sydenstricker (3), Viakil (4), Gopalan (5), Hou (6), (7), etc. are important contributors. The disease has been reported in tIhe United States of America, England, Africa, India, Malaya and is quite common in China, especially among soldiers, students, coolies, refugees and prisoners.

Neuromyelitis optica is a comparatively rare disease. It was first described by Sir Clifford Allbutt (1) in 1870 and was given this name by Devic (2) in 1894. Since that time, it has often been referred to as the "Devic Syndrome".

The iris of a Chinese eye has an anterior limiting layer which is very dense and tough due to numerous chromatophores. In European eyes, the tissue of the iris has a sponge-like consistency, while Chinese irides have much fewer hollow spaces And very few crypts. For this reason, homatropine and atropine act more slowly and less efficiently in Chinese than in European eyes. In both types the anterior limiting layer ends near the root but in Europe.an eyes it is much thinner and more delicate than the rest of the tissues. In rare cases the root is represented only by the two layers of pigment epithelium.

Modern writers like Parsons (1), Koby (2) and Duke-Elder (3) state that persistent remnants of the pupillary membrane are extremely common. Staehli (4) in 1913 reported that with the use of slit-lamp, out of 1600 eyes, 506 (i.e. 30.6%) had evidences of persistent pupillary membrance. Many of the so-called "membranes" are merely one or two delicate filaments which are hardly visible to the naked eye.

The amplitudes of ocular accommodation decreases with increase of age and the average range for each age appears to vary in different peoples as gathered from tests made on Americans (2), Germans (3) and Japanese (4).

Acute alcohol poisoning resulting in total blindness has very seldom or never been reported in CHinese literature, because in the first place, Chinese wines, even concentrated ones--e.g. pai-kan (white wine of the North), fen-chiu (Shensi), mao-tai (Kweichow), ta-chu (Szechuan), etc.--are distilled from grain and free from aldehydic impirities; secondly, there is no prohibition of alcholic liquors in China, and hence no illicit trading in toxic alcoholic drinks; and thirdly, methanol is not manufactured in China, and the small amounts imported are destined for industrial and laboratory purposes and too expensive to be used as adulterants.

The intracapsular method of cataract extraction has gained considerable favor in the United States in recent years. At present it is the method of choice in extraction of certain types of cataracts in most of the better-known eye clinics.