The ship captain's medical guide / compiled by Harry Leach.

  • Leach, Harry.
Date:
1874
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The ship captain's medical guide / compiled by Harry Leach. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    bowels begins. Give them the diarrhoea mixture (page 83) after every loose motion, doubling the dose if necessary, and, above all, let them have as much rest as you can. Throw overboard immediately all stools passed, and, if possible, all soiled clothes, and wash out the quarters where the patient is berthed frequently with carbolic acid water. Medicines are useless in the second stage (cramps, &c.); so keep the patient as warm as possible, and give him as much cold water as he wishes to drink. Give no medicine in the third stage (fever), but keep up the patient's strength with good diet. DYSENTERY. This disease is almost entirely confined to the crews of ships trading to China and the East Indies ; sometimes, but much more rarely, it occurs in ships coming from the West Indies, west coast of Africa, South America, and some of the Mediterranean ports, particularly Alexandria and Odessa. The symptoms are well known to most captains:— Looseness of the bowels, with much straining, stools more or less bloody, resulting in great general weakness. In nine-tenths of the cases that occur in East India and China ships, the sailors will tell you that they had dysentery in the country before sailing, and B 2
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