An improved mode of employing mercury by fumigation to the whole body, exemplified by cases of its success. ... in various obstinate diseases of the skin, and especially in syphilitic affections / by Jonathan Green.

Date:
1852
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An improved mode of employing mercury by fumigation to the whole body, exemplified by cases of its success. ... in various obstinate diseases of the skin, and especially in syphilitic affections / by Jonathan Green. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    1G IMPROVED MODE OF APPLYING MERCURIAL FUMIGATION. passages ready to run into destructive ulceration, which in- duced me to have the head included in the. apparatus, in order to get the mercurial fumes in contact with the parts affected. “ The conveniences also arising from the use of mercurial fumigations deserve to be considered. There is no fear of taking cold; even the patients themselves, after they have had one or two fumigations, lose all fear of taking cold, as it is called, so much heat has been absorbed and retained as to dispel all such apprehension. “There is no occasion for patients to go to bed after the mer- curial fumigations; my own patients never have done so. It is not necessary, and can only tend to exude from the system what it has been the object to put into the system, and influ- ence it beneficially. There needs no confinement to the room or the house whilst taking mercurial fumigations, and the pa- tient can proceed with his cure in secret, that is, without the knowledge or exposure to servants, observing-friends or talk- ing washerwomen, as in cases when we influence the system by rubbing in blue ointment, &c. “ Much might be added, but that I fear to trespass. The subject is of much practical importance, and my object in this paper is to bring before the profession the little-known advan- tages of mercurial fumigations, which are to be advised in all stages, and in many complications of Syphilis. “ I am, Sir, yours, &c. “ Jonathan Green, M. D., &c. “40, Great Marlborough Street.” Conclusion. I am aware that some members of the profession will be inclined to question the remedial powers which have thus been brought before them. 1 therefore court their investi- gation and testing of the means, lest they may think I have been extolling the fumigations unwarrantably. To all such surmises I must submit I hold the means as highly curative for most diseases, but not as an infallible cure, even for a toothache; and would assure all such practitioners that I have practised the profession too long to be so misled; so long, indeed, as to be painfully alive to the insufficiency of remedies for most ailments, until I became familiar with the fumigatory treatment. Instead of overrating that treat- ment, 1 am conscious of my inability to do it justice, and would ask any physiologist or pathologist what means he can bring for the relief of disease that equals increased temporary heat and moisture?—to which add, that all-important medicine, mercury, at perfect control, and freed from the objections, uncertainties and disagreeables that more or less always attend its internal use. J. G.
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