Central African Journal of Medicine - Volume 16, Issue 8, August 1970

Salt and water balance are controlled by three factors: (a) Vasopressin is mainly concerned with the conservation of water. (b) The renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system regulates sodium excretion. (c) The sympathetic vasomotor nerves can prevent the loss of both sodium and water. All three factors operate, in part at least, by changing the proportion of superficial cortical to deep juxta-medullary nephrons that are functioning at any one time. A shift of activity from the superficial to the deep nephrons can be a very effective means of avoiding an unnecessary loss of salt and water in the urine.

It can thus be seen that it is very necessary to train microscopists to recognise not only true parasite species and their products, but also basically similar pseudo-parasitic species to improve the diagnostic efficiency of the laboratory and to ensure reliable laboratory reports for the physician.

A series of Rhodesian Europeans were found to be passing the active forms of E. hislolytica in their stools and were mildly affected. Only a few passed blood and mucus in the motions. Diarrhoea or loose motions were more often encountered. Liver abscess in the European seems to be rare. To the Africans, adult or child, the dysentery may be fulminating on occasions and liver abscess is not uncommonly encountered in practice.