Oliver Wendell Holmes and the contagiousness of puerperal fever : an address delivered at Marlborough, Wiltshire, to the Trowbridge division of the Bath and Bristol branch of the British Medical Association, October 28, 1905 / by Charles J. Cullingworth.

  • Cullingworth, Charles J. (Charles James), 1841-1908.
Date:
1906
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Oliver Wendell Holmes and the contagiousness of puerperal fever : an address delivered at Marlborough, Wiltshire, to the Trowbridge division of the Bath and Bristol branch of the British Medical Association, October 28, 1905 / by Charles J. Cullingworth. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    be more open and explicit than the account given by Dr. Peirson of Salem of the cases seen by him. In the first nineteen days of January, 1829, he had five consecutive cases of puerperal fever, every patient he attended being attacked and the three first cases proving fatal. In March of the same year he had two moderate cases, in June another case, in July another, which [last] proved fatal. ' Up to this period,' he remarks, ' I am not informed that a single case occurred in the practice of any other physician.' It appears that Dr. Peirson had altogether in his practice twenty cases of puer- peral fever, of which four were fatal. In the year 1842, the attention of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia was called to the prevalence of puerperal fever of a peculiarly insidious and malignant character in the practice of one of the Fellows of the College. Every woman that this physician had attended during several weeks past was said to have been attacked by the fever, while no instance of the disease had occurred amongst the patients of any other accoucheur practising within the same district. Dr. Condie, who reported the circumstances, although dis- posed to be sceptical as to the contagious nature of many so-called contagious diseases, declared himself convinced by the facts that had come under his notice that the puerperal fever, in the particular form it had on this occasion assumed, was certainly communicable. The physician referred to. Dr. Rutter, stated that, a succession of cases having occurred in his practice, he went away for a week, but that he could not readily believe in the transmissibility of the disease from patient to patient or from physician to patient, inasmuch as one of the very first patients he attended after his return was attacked by the fever and died, notwithstanding that he had not used on that occasion any article of clothing he had used before. These remarks were made on the 3rd of May, 1842,
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