This case of nontropical sprue is reported because of the typical exacerbations with the patient on a faulty diet, the repeated remissions with the patient on a hospital sprue regimen, the association with a previously performed gastro-enterostomy, the marked loss of stature and the not unusual negative postmortem observations. The patient was hospitalized four times for sprue in a period of five years and three months and spent seventeen and one-half months in three different hospitals. The records from all these institutions are here brought together.
REPORT OF CASE
History and Examination.—
A man aged 42, a chef, first seen by one of us on his first admission to the King County Hospital at Seattle May 21, 1931, had not been in the tropics. His complaints were diarrhea, weakness, loss of weight, pain in the back and swelling of the lower extremities. For many years he had had stomach