The gastro-intestinal tract is subject to every sort of inflammatory process, ranging in severity from a simple catarrhal type to a definite phlegmon. As in other organ systems, the milder types of inflammation are overwhelmingly more frequent. Among the least frequent types of lesion is the phlegmon. It was first described by Sand in 1700.
Phlegmon is found with a frequency which decreases in almost inverse proportion to the distance of its site from the stomach. Finsterer in 1928 collected from the literature and from his own records reports of two hundred and ninety-six cases of phlegmon of the stomach. There has been no definitive study of phlegmon of the small intestine in recent years comparable with Finsterer's monograph. However, it was necessary for me to review most of the reported cases while searching for those of phlegmon of the colon, and it is my impression that there are about