CASE OF FILARIA LOA.
BY
D. ARGYLL ROBERTSON, M.D., F.R.C.S.Ed.,
OCULIST TO H.M. THE QUEEN IN SCOTLAND; PRESIDENT OF THE
OPHTHALMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF THE UNITED KINGDOM; LECTURER ON
DISEASES OF THE EYE IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH, ETC.
Reprinted from the ‘Transactions of the Ophthalmological Society.’
LONDON:
PRINTED BY ADLARD AND SON,
BARTHOLOMEW CLOSE, E.C., and 20, HANOVER SQUARE, W.
1895.
PLATE VI
Illustrates Dr. Argyll Robertson’s paper on Filaria loa.
Male Filaria Loa.
Fig. 1.—The whole worm. Portions of the testicles and alimentary canal protruding through a rupture of the wall of the parasite.
Fig. 2.—The head of the worm.
Fig. 3.—The curved tail of the worm with its papillæ.
Fig. 4.—The ruptured part of the worm with protruding alimentary canal and testes.
Communication read at the Meeting of the OphthalmologicalSociety on October 18th, 1894.
Case of Filaria loa, in which the parasite was removedfrom under the conjunctiva.
By D. Argyll Robertson.
(With Plate VI.)
On the 29th of June last I was consulted by MissJ. H⸺ on account of what she termed the presence of aworm in her eye.
She is a slightly anæmic, prematurely grey-haired, butotherwise healthy-looking lady, thirty-two years of age.She has resided at Old Calabar on the West Coast ofAfrica at intervals, for nearly eight years altogether. Shetwice had to return home on account of debility followingsevere intermittent fever. During her last visit to OldCalabar, which extended to about eighteen months, shesuffered almost the whole time from chronic dysenteryfollowed by severe remittent fever, which necessitated herreturn to this country last January in a very weak stateof health.
She stated that the worm was first observed by her inFebruary of this year, immediately after her return home.It frequented both eyes, but showed a preference for theleft one, sometimes coursing over the surface of the eyeunder the conjunctiva, sometimes wriggling under theskin of the eyelids—causing a tickling, irritating sensation,but not real pain. It had latterly restricted itsvisits entirely to the left eye. On account of the remittentfever from which she was still suffering, her bedroom,when she first came home, was kept well heated, and until[2]she recovered from the fever she noticed that the wormwas particularly lively, occasionally causing the eye tobecome bloodshot, and the eyelids to swell and blackenslightly. As long as she was confined to warm rooms theworm was almost constantly moving about in the neighbourhoodof the eye, causing such irritati