A history of the disease usually called typhoid fever : as it has appeared in Georgetown and its vicinity, with some reflections as to its causes and nature / by W.L. Sutton.

  • William Loftus Sutton
Date:
1850
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A history of the disease usually called typhoid fever : as it has appeared in Georgetown and its vicinity, with some reflections as to its causes and nature / by W.L. Sutton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    beo-inninsr. The history of the case as given does not seem to warrant that conclusion. Still the author may have had his attention so fixed upon some features of the case, as to prevent his seeing others, important to the pro- per understanding of it. In the cases from Horner there is evidently no suspi- cion entertained by the author, that anything of what is usually called fever, affected the patients. Matthew's case, given before, I considered one of pure consumption and there was nothing- to change my opinion; and 1 have the satisfaction of having a confirmation of this opinion in the judgement of Professor Bartlett. Perh;,ps it would not be uncharitable to suppose that some of the cases re] orted as infantile remittent, or even as cholera infantum were in truth those of typhoid iever; as I cannot conceive that it would be difficult to confound them; but I should suppose painter's colic ought not to be so confounded. Upon a careful examination of the whole ground, shall we conclnde that the lesions of Peyer's plates are invari- able and characteristic of typhoid fever—that they are to be found in no other disease? Truly I cannot bring myself to do so. Shall we conclude that they do not indicate a distinct form of disease or even a distinct disease? I am not prepared for that either. Shall we say that they are an accidental symptom which may occur in many different diseases, and even exist independent of other symptoms? It behooves us to be cautious in this matter. In our pro- fession we have had a sufficiency of hasty conclusions, drawn from insufficient observations, which have been re- placed by other conclusions drawn from facts equally un- satisfactory. I hope we shall leave this matter under in- vestigation, until we shall have accumulated facts suffi- cient to enable us to come to conclusions, which shall remain permanent.