A haematological and chemical study of the blood during the alarm reaction.

The effect of shock on body tissues has been recognized for many years, although the fundamental causes of shock still remain obscure. [...] At the beginning of the Great War it was generally believed, as the result of animal experiments, that the state of surgical shock was due to a deficiency of the fluid contents in circulating blood. Greatly increased interest was aroused in this condition as a result of the War. On the battlefields shock occurred on an enormous scale, especially when wounds were caused by fragments of shell, bombs and grenades. [...] In most of the treatises on shock a large amount of space has been devoted to the theories of shock which various investigators have enunciated and supported by argument and experiment. However, in spite of the large amount of attention it has received, it has remained an enigma. [...] Exposure to cold, traumatic injuries, excessive muscular exercise, spinal shock, acute infection and intoxication with various drugs will evoke this syndrome if they damage the organism sufficiently. This reaction has been termed the "General Adaptation Reaction," and is divided into three different stages, which are - the "stage of alarm", the "stage of resistance" and the "stage of exhaustion." In the pages to follow the "adaptation reaction" and its three divisions will be discussed in detail. [...