RT Journal
A1 Phair JP
T1 FEver
JF Archives of Internal Medicine
JO Archives of Internal Medicine
YR 1979
FD November 1
VO 139
IS 11
SP 1219
OP 1219
DO 10.1001/archinte.1979.03630480009004
UL http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/archinte.1979.03630480009004
AB Fever and hyperthermia, the subject of a recent symposium of the American Physiologic Society and an article questioning the utility of fever patterns as a diagnostic aid by Musher et al in this issue of the Archives (see p 1225), have long been of interest to physicians. Atkins and Bodel point out that elevation of body temperature is recorded in the Sumerian cuneiform writings of the sixth century BC. During the 19th century, temperature regulation was recognized as an example of homeostasis, balancing heat produced by metabolic activity with loss through autonomic control of superficial blood flow.1 The first suggestion that fever was due to endogenous pyrogen was also made before the turn of the century, but Beeson's discovery in the 1940s of the production of "leukocyte pyrogen" renewed interest in the mechanism of induction of fever by inflammation.2 It is now well established that clinical fevers, as