The abdominal complications of the epidemic of influenza in October, 1918, present problems of interest in diagnosis and treatment. The clinical pictures varied so greatly that a grouping of the cases will be of value.
ABDOMINAL RIGIDITY AND TENDERNESS
The question frequently arose as to whether the boardlike rigidity and tenderness of one or both upper quardrants of the abdomen was due to acute abdominal affection or to muscle spasm from lesions of the chest.Some of these cases were seen in the first twenty-four hours of the disease, before the physical signs of a pneumonia or of a pleurisy were sufficiently evident to make a positive diagnosis, all available methods, including the roentgen ray, being employed. The upper abdominal pain, with or without accompanying rigidity, which is seen in acute thoracic disease, has always been held to be reflex. Two cases of pneumonia following influenza showed at necropsy localized