PHAGEDENA (Gr., from plurgein, to eat or corrode) designates'a variety of ulcera tion in which there is much infiltration, and at the same time rapid destruction of the affected part. The sore presents an irregular outline and a yellowish surface; it gives off a profuse bloody or iehorish discharge, and is extremely painful. It usually attacks persons whose constitutions are vitiated by scro'ula, by the syphilitic virus, by •the abuse of mercury. by intemperance, etc. It not very unfrequently appears iu the throat after scarlatina in a severe form. If is not afforded by the internal administration of opium (to allay the pain), and of quinia, or sonic other preparation of bark. wine, beef tea, etc., to improve the tone of the constitution, together with astringent and sedative local applications, recourse must be had to the destruction of the part by strong nitric acid, or some other caustic.
The terrible disease known in civil practice as SLOUGH ING PHA GED.ENA, and in mili tary and naval practice as HosnrrAn GANGRENE. is merely, according to sonic of our highest surgical authorities, a state of phagedmna in its fullest development. This dis
order requires for its development the influence of some of those undefined causes which regulate the outbreak of epidemics, and is peculiarly characterized by its contagious and infectious nature. It is usually engendered by the overcrowding of sick and wounded men, and seine idea of its virulence may be formed from the fact that on the return of the French fleet from the Crimean war, no less than GO deaths from it occurred in one ship in the course of 38 hours. It is not of frequent occurrence in the London hospitals; but it broke out in the Middlesex hospital in'1835, in University College hospital in 1844, and in St. Bartholomew's and St. George's hospitals in 1847 (Druitt's Su•geon's Vade-mecum, 8th ed. p. 72, note). For details respecting this disorder the reader is referred to Ilennen's Principles of Military Surgery, Boggle On Hospital Gangrene, and the article on by Mr. Holmes Coote in Holmes's System of Surgery, vol i.