PLICA POLONICA is the name given to a disease which is chiefly remarkable for the sticking together and matting of the hair, and which is peculiarly frequent in Poland : a few examples of it have been met with in Tartary, among the lower orders of the Ruasians, and in Hungary, and fewer still in Switzerland and France.
The disease chiefly affects the scalp ; the hair grows to an unusual length, is matted together by a sticky and most offensively-smelling secretion, and is commonly infested with vermin. Indeed, the symptoms of the disease, as far as the hair is concerned, are only those which would result from excessive neglect of cleanliness ; and hence many who have seen numerous cases in Poland, believe that they are only produced by the dirty habits of those affected, who, it is well known, if the disease do not spontaneorudy make its appearance, spare no pains to produce it. So great is the prejudice in favour of Plies entertained by the lower order of Foles, who regard it as affording a certain security from all other sickness and misfortunes, that they will through their whole live. endure the inconvenience and misery of carrying about huge =asses of filthy stinking hair many feet in length, rather than submit to the removal of it, which is necessary for their relief.
The hair of persons affected with Pliea Poloniett has been carefully examined under the microscope, and Offusberg and Von Walther have Loth described the cells of fungi belonging to the genus Trichophyton. The parasite as described by Giinsberg consists of articulated fila ments surrouuded by innumerable spores of very minute size. The
changes in the hair produced by this parasite consist in the thickening of the root of the hair, a spindle-like enlargement of the longitudinal cylinder of the channel of the hair, through the constant piling up of new masses of fungi in it, in the splitting and parting of single hair fibres, which gives at butt to the hair the appearance of a brush, or of a hedgehog skin, at the point through which the spores of the fungus pars. The epithelium or cells of the hair are very much condensed, and the hair cylinder frequently altogether disappears. In the adhesive mass are found a great many large epithelial cells with small granular bodies, resembling the exudation corpuscles of inflammation. Von Walther attempted to inoculate Pike Poloniea, but did not succeed.
Herr von Studzienski, a Russian, has recently written on the Plies, and endeavoured to show that it was only an intense form of the natural condition of moulting. This view however is not supported by the facts of the case, and no one can doubt its specially morbid nature, after such researches as those of Von Walther and.Gtinsberg.
The only treatment which is known to be constantly beneficial is the removal of the hair, and strict cleanliness; other means must be decided in each case by the general state of the patient's health. The popular notion entertained in Poland, that dangerous diseases will follow the cutting of the hair, is entirely without foundation.
(Kuchenmeister on Animal and Vegetable Parasites, translated by Lankester, 1547.)