Manual of diseases of the skin / from the French of Cazenave ; with notes and additions by Thomas H. Burgess.
- Pierre Louis Alphée Cazenave
- Date:
- 1854
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Manual of diseases of the skin / from the French of Cazenave ; with notes and additions by Thomas H. Burgess. Source: Wellcome Collection.
47/446 page 37
![The remedies employed in the treatment of diseases of the skin may be divided into local and general. Of the former, emollient remedies (amongst which we reckon baths) are those with which we should, generally speaking, commence. They often cure the disease without the assistance of any other means. To mention the great variety of local remedies employed would occupy too much of our time ; the principal are décoction of meal with bran, barley, emollient flowers or roots, solutions of gélatine, potato flour, poultices of ground rice, local or general baths, milk, &c. Fatty substances are often employed in the form of ointment or pomatum, but we should be very careful how we use them ; they should always be perfectly fresh, and even then are subject to become rancid ; hence the cerates are préférable. Lorry believes that fatty matter acts by causing the accumulation of insensible perspiration on the surface of the skin, and tkus producing the effect of a kind of local bath. Among local soothing remedies we would place certain prépara- tions of lead, hydrocyanie acid, cherry-laurel water, and the cyanuret of potassium, which often act like a charm in appeasing itching. Heberden recommends local stimulants in cases where the itching is very severe, but Bateman justly remarks that this treat- ment only applies to cases in which the epidermis remains intact ;* otherwise emollient and soothing remedies are préférable. The température of emollient applications, such as baths, poultices, embrocations, &c., should not exceed 90° F. But when there is much beat, pain, and itching, great benefit may be derived from the use of water cooled down to 36° F. The linseed meal so often employed for poultices is seldom fresh, and frequently causes irrita- tion, or even pustular éruptions. fesaion, aa an original work, bearing his signature, a literal translation, Verbatim et literutim, of an early édition of this volume, with the simple modification of two or three Unes of introductory matter at the head of each ohapter. No wonder that M. Cazenave should express his “ surprise and regret” at Buch moral obliquity.—B.] 1 the student will dérivé much assistance from a good magnifying glass, while observing the progress of the éruption during the early period of the disease. It will also materially facilitate the diagnosis in diificult oases, by giving the observer a more correct idea of the elementary lésion, than ho could obtain with the naked eye.]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b28049573_0047.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
