The pathology and treatment of white swelling of the knee / by A.B. Judson.

  • Judson, Adoniram Brown, 1837-1916.
Date:
1899
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The pathology and treatment of white swelling of the knee / by A.B. Judson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    Reprinted from The Medical News, Dec. 30, 1899 ] TH E PATHOLOGY AN D TR E ATM ENT OF WHITE SWELLI NG OF THE KNEE.1 By A. B. JUDSON, M.D., OF NEW YORK. Pathology, or knowledge concerning disease, may be said to be the prime requisite of the physician. It often stands higher in public estimation than the ability to cure. In the case of a patient whose symptoms are equivocal, for whom advice is sought in differ- ent directions, the physician who is in attendance when the nature of the disease finally declares it- self has undisputed control. As knowledge goes before opinion, advice, prescription or operation, pathology should take the precedence in our medi- cal studies. But how changeful is our Pathology ! How fickle a divinity ! It is said that the average life of a pathological doctrine is about 30 years. We learn, but with the prospect of having to un- learn; and the all-wise, unwise, public senses this and goes doubtfully away, “trembling, hoping, lin- gering, flying,” to fanes where the divinities are not only fickle but meretricious. In the consideration of the present subject, how- ever, we are in a field where pathology and thera- peutics have some of the stability of an exact science. It is a settled pathological doctrine that inflamma- tion is prolonged by the exercise of the affected part. White swelling of the knee goes from bad to 1 Read before the Orthopedic Section of the New York Academy of M edicine, October 20, 1899.