Talk:Chyle

Comment

Hi I have a problem with the following sentence: "It (chyle) is formed in the small intestine during digestion of ingested fatty foods and taken up by lymph vessels (lacteals)". This misleads the reader into thinking that lacteals are synonymous with all lymph vessels. This is false. Lacteals are special types of lymphatic vessels that originate in the small intestine. Sure readers could follow the link for this clarification, but many people wouldn't bother. Therefore a subtle, harmless distinction SHOULD be made.

I am replacing the above sentence with this one: "It (chyle) is formed in the small intestine during digestion of ingested fatty foods and taken up by lymph vessels specifically known as lacteals"

If this could be better worded then please discuss changes but do not revert it back to the original without prior discussion.

Historical usage?

I found this passage in the memoirs of Casanova, "Physicians disagreed as to the cause of the disease. He loses, they would say, two pounds of blood every week; yet there cannot be more than sixteen or eighteen pounds in his body. What, then, can cause so abundant a bleeding? One asserted that in me all the chyle turned into blood; another was of opinion that the air I was breathing must, at each inhalation, increase the quantity of blood in my lungs, and contended that this was the reason for which I always kept my mouth open." I am wondering if chyle has the same definition today as it did in 1794?