Friedman's Vasomotor Syndrome

FRIEDMAN'S VASOMOTOR SYNDROME (Friedmann), described by him in a series of works, represents one of the forms of concussion. On the basis of a series of cases, studied partly clinically and partly both clinically and anatomically, Friedman asserts that "concussion in its pure form causes persistent changes in blood vessels and that the vascular system is the only one of all tissues that suffers anatomically demonstrable damage from this." In his cases accompanied by autopsy, Friedman notes the absence of gross macroscopic changes and the presence of microscopic changes exclusively in the vascular apparatus and especially in the small and medium-sized arteries: hyperemia of small vessels and capillaries, fresh capillary hemorrhages, in places marked dilation of capillaries (10-20 times against normal), round-cell infiltrates of the vessel walls. As a substantially important fact, Friedman emphasizes the complete preservation of both nervous and glial tissue. In F. v. s. the following are observed: severe diffuse headaches, especially occurring in attacks; dizziness, mainly appearing when bending the entire body, but also when bending only the head; exhaustion and depletion of all higher functions of the brain and sense organs; reduction of volitional activity both in physical and in spiritual spheres; rapid smoothing of received impressions, reduction of ability to remember; intolerance to heat and to alcoholic beverages; appearance of severe cyanosis and dizziness with slight compression of the carotid arteries, depending on irregularities in cerebral circulation. The main difficulty in diagnosis is, of course, differentiation from traumatic neuroses. The symptom complex of Friedman is characterized by the absence of such frequent symptoms in traumatic neurosis as pains in distant parts of the body, paresthesias, feeling of anxiety and fear, neurasthenic phenomena from the psychic sphere, hypochondriacal and obsessive states. The absence of these symptoms gives the complaints of patients with vasomotor symptom complex a monotonous, stereotyped character, while traumatic neurosis is characterized by motley, diverse clinical pictures. In general, Friedman characterizes his symptom complex as "morbid weakness of the brain" in contrast to ordinary neuroses, where the issue is about "general irritative weakness". It goes without saying, however, that both forms can easily combine, forming clinical pictures of high complexity. The course of the vasomotor symptom complex can have different characters. In mild cases, the matter seems to be limited exclusively to functional anomalies in vessel filling, repeated anemias and hyperemias. With time, in unfavorable cases, under the influence of such functional anomalies of circulation, persistent changes in arterial walls are formed. The disease can thus have a chronically progressive course and, as Friedman's observations show, lead to death many years after receiving the injury. In the initial stage, all those therapeutic measures that are indicated for concussion should be applied: complete rest, symptomatic treatment - cardiac agents in case of cardiac weakness, etc. In the further course, in the presence of progressive course - all those measures that are recommended for arteriosclerosis of the brain (see Apoplexy).

I. Filimonov. de FRIS Hugo (Hugo de Vries; 1848-1935), famous Dutch botanist, author of the mutation theory. After graduating from university (F. studied in Germany, was a student of the famous botanist Sachs) he took the position of teacher at a real school in Amsterdam, from 1877 he became privat-docent in Halle, from 1878 - professor of plant physiology, and later - professor of botany and director of the botanical garden in Amsterdam. F.'s first scientific works were devoted to the physiology of sugar beet, potato and other cultivated plants. Then he gave a series of valuable works from the field of plant physiology. Of particular importance are his studies of plant plasmolysis. He studied the osmotic properties of different substances and the relationship of their osmotic action to their molecular weight. In the era of fascination with speculative theories of heredity, F. published a work on the carriers of hereditary traits in cells ("Intracellular pangensis", 1889), which, in his opinion, are contained in the nuclei of cells in an inactive state, but upon entering the plasma they show activity and thus determine the properties of the cell. F. acquired the greatest fame and glory with his mutation theory (see Mutation), which was the result of his many years of observations on the culture of Oenothera lamarkiana ("Mutationstheorie", V. I-II, Lpz., 1901-03). In 1918, F. retired. Selected works of F. were published in 1932 in Russian in the series "Classics of Natural Science" (M.).