| Abstract
| - Abstract. The published discussions of intestinal leprosy are scanty and contradictory. There is some evidence for the belief that relatively benign leprous infiltration of the submucosa of the gastro-intestinal tract may take place. It is possible that rarely, particularly during a lepra reaction, this infiltration may undergo necrosis causing active ulceration which is aggravated by secondary infection with intestinal flora. In the case which has been described, the patient died during an active lepra reaction and had diarrhoea terminally. Autopsy revealed numerous necrotic ulcers along the entire large intestine; there was also oedema, necrosis, and haemorrhage in the wall of the gallbladder. The presence of leprosy bacilli in these lesions and the absence of other aetiological agents provide presumptive proof that they were due to leprosy. As far as I have been able to determine, Von Reisner's is the only previously published case which can be considered to be ulcerative leprosy of the intestine; I have found no reports of leprous cholecystitis.
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