History and description of an epidemic fever, commonly called spotted fever, which prevailed at Gardiner, Maine, in the spring of 1814 / by E. Hale, jr.

Date:
1818
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: History and description of an epidemic fever, commonly called spotted fever, which prevailed at Gardiner, Maine, in the spring of 1814 / by E. Hale, jr. 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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    moval. In the complicated form, those symp- toms are deceptive, and lead to an erroneous practice, unless corrected by the maxim just mentioned. It is indeed true, that there was a very great variety of symptoms and appearances in different patients; and of course, a corresponding variety was requisite in the modes of practice, in order to adapt the remedies to the individual cases. But it is equally true, that there were certain genera] features, and habits, which were common to all, and which, if they do not prove the dis- ease to be the same, at least, shew that it always belonged to the same family. This uniformity of disease does not extend so far, as to justify a physician in prescribing with- out a rigid and careful attention to the particu- lar symptoms of each individual case ; much less in opposition to the indications of those symp- toms. On the contrary, it is a motive and an important one, for extending the investigation farther, and shews the necessity of considering the symptoms, not. only in relation to each other, in the case before him, but also in relation to other diseases by which it may be surrounded. It certainly is matter of observation, and not of theory merely, that acute diseases vary very much at different times, in the extent to which they require evacuations, and the facility with