Essays on the theory of convulsive diseases / by Marshall Hall.

  • Marshall Hall
Date:
[1848]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Essays on the theory of convulsive diseases / by Marshall Hall. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ceedings even of the physician. Let us substitute the word convulsion. Who would propose to treat convulsion by ad¬ ministering a remedy? Do we treat the convulsions of children, or of the puerperal patient, in this manner ? Do we not consider the case in all its bearings, and administer eveny curative measure ? Do we not, in a word, treat the case scientifically, and not empirically ? But if we designate a given case by the term epilepsy, do we not, forthwith, begin to think of musk or of indigo ? § 13. Of the Treatment. How inadequate and derogatory is the idea entertained by the public, and by many physicians, of what is required for the treatment of a patient afflicted with epilepsy ! It would seem that their notions of the medical art cannot be raised above that of discovering a remedy for a disease. Let such persons read what I have written, and let me ask them whe¬ ther it is a remedy, or a system of remedies—of juvantia and of leedentia—that must be carefully attended to. The idea of a remedy, even, is a superstition, except in a few rare instances. The trust in an amulet, a necklace, a ring, is not a more deplorable weakness than that which is implicitly placed by many in Baron Sloet’s powder, in musk, in indigo, in a valerianate, in homoeopathy.' Alas! I have known persons of rank and fortune trust the health of those whom they hold most dear, to such follies, whilst they expose their patient to the morbid influences of a polluted and heated atmosphere, of excitement, of late hours, of that combination of evils, the opera—casting off common sense, to say nothing of science* and philosophy. And yet some good is attained by this empiricism. The confidence of the patient is a security against many baneful emotions, and time is gained for Nature to cure the disease. What is then the proper treatment of epilepsy ? First, let us well consider the causes of this dire malady, and scrupu¬ lously avoid them ; then let us weigh the effects of some of these, and of the seizures themselves, in the excited condition of the spinal system, and the congested condition of the cere¬ bral, and let us administer every rational remedy to subdue the one and remove the other. E
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