The change of life in health and disease : a practical treatise on the nervous and other affections incidental to women at the decline of life / by Edward John Tilt.

  • Edward John Tilt
Date:
1871
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The change of life in health and disease : a practical treatise on the nervous and other affections incidental to women at the decline of life / by Edward John Tilt. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

    30/346 (page 22)
    another work,* contending that in many of the worst cases, there was a prospect of the mental faculties being restored at the change of life; and quoting my suggestion, Sir W. C. Hood has admirably pleaded the cause of many most unfortu- nate women confined for life at Broadmoor for infanticide or other great crimes, committed during a temporary attack of puerperal mania, rightly observing that,f though there may be danger in restoring them to society while impregnation is pos- sible, and therefore another attack also of puerperal mania, there can be none in releasing them some time after the change of life, and the late Dr. Ferrus, Inspector-Genera] of French Prisons, entertaining the same opinion, the plan was successfully tried, and several women have been restored to society, for ten or twelve years, without a relapse having occurred. The following case related by X egrier exemplifies the inti- mate connection between marked ovarian action and insanity, as well as the beneficial influence of cessation Case 1 Madame X. was tall and lymphatic, and had been badly brought up. Menstruation first came at twelve, was very painful and irregular, accompanied by epigastric oppres- sion, palpitation, convulsions, hypochondriasis, and suicidal mania. During the year that followed marriage, at thirty- eight, the attacks were less severe, but they became more so on the menstrual flow becoming scanty, and she never con- ceived. Some days before the menstrual period Madame X. became melancholy and secluded herself; there were lumbar and lower-limb pains, but the right iliac fossa was the spot whence radiated all her sufferings. She had made twenty dif- ferent attempts at suicide, and when detected was ashamed of herself, and promised not to do it again. The fits would last five or six days, being most severe on alternate months. Dur- ing the dodging time the fits were less severe, always coincid- ing with the menstrual flow; they failed to come in winter, and ceased altogether when menstruation left off at fifty-four. * Elements of Health and Principles of Female Hygiene. Bonn, York Street, Covent Garden, London. f Criminal Lunacy, by W. C. Hood, M.D. Churchill, New Bur- lington Street.