Paroxysmal Cold Hemoglobinurias

DRESSLER 1 is credited with having first reported observations on a case of cold a symptom complex now known to have two separate and distinct etiologic bases. The first and more generally recognized type is syphilitic paroxysmal cold hemoglobinuria, a disease seen in a small percentage of persons with syphilis and caused by a cold-warm hemolysin unique to persons with syphilis with this disease. The second and nonsyphilitic type is cold hemagglutination paroxysmal hemoglobinuria, a disease accompanied with unusually high titers of cold hemagglutinins and first reported by Salen 2 in 1935 when he recorded observations on pronounced cold agglutination of the red blood cells of a nonsyphilitic patient with paroxysmal cold hemoglobinuria. This paper will be concerned primarily with the syphilitic type of paroxysmal cold hemoglobinuria. Care was taken to avoid the error of including reports of cold hemagglutination paroxysmal hemoglobinuria in this review of cases of