Counter-irritation, its principles and practice, : illustrated by one hundred cases of the most painful and important diseases effectually cured by external applications. / By A.B. Granville.

  • Augustus Granville
Date:
1838
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Counter-irritation, its principles and practice, : illustrated by one hundred cases of the most painful and important diseases effectually cured by external applications. / By A.B. Granville. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    4 ae be ae value of any. particular fashion, or passing: object. of attraction, especially in medicine, is guided ‘by gregarious instinct, and sel- dom by their own native good sense. . Mr. Lawrence, in his surgi- _cal lectures, remarks that acupuncturation had been found useful in. certain obscure painful affections, and in rheumatism, “ but that it was now out of fashion.” . » Ae RSE Rteeg a oe ear ee 49, The-moxa is making some oy in the hospitals in this country, and is very little, if at all, adopted in private practice; yet, according to.a very great authority, fons Larrey, we deprive ourselves of one of the most. powerful auxiliaries in medicine by neglecting the moxa.: I find it stated, by the same eminent surgeon and. physiologist, that the moxa,is considered by him as a more powerful remedy than the issue or seton ; and that, viewing it as a. species of actual cautery, it is a powerful agent,..and perhaps too much neglected in this country.. Let us hear from a most worthy historian of their country,-what the Chinese: think of the moxa. “'The Chinese physicians,” observes Mr. Davis,! “reckon the appli: cation of the moxa or ‘actual cautery among the most effectual means for the alleviation of local, pain.’ . Their moxa is prepared _ by bruising the stems ‘of an artemisia, called’ gae-tsaow, in amortar, - and then selecting the most downy fibres... These, being set:on fire upon the, part affected, are said to consume rapidly, without pro- ducing any severe pain.” It will be recollected that Sir W. Temple has. recorded, in a very clear and able manner, his own recovery from gout, by the use of the moxa, agreeably to the Chinese fashion, the materials of which he had obtained from Batavia. In a-subse- quent part of the present volume.I have described a mode recently adopted by the French, for raising an instantaneous blister ; a mode which ought. properly to be considered asa kind of moxa, and as ‘such deserves to be mentioned.in this place.. For obvious reasons, however,.] must refer fora description of: it to the concluding part of the dast.sectionsis 6 ot ose Yaya Riscae eB ioe tape _60. The .rollet, or wooden, roller; is: an’ instrument: of. ancient date, and of general use among the natives of some of the southern’ _parts.of India, for the cure: of rheumatic and muscular. pains and’ ‘swellings. Its introduction into this country for the same. purposes is comparatively recent. The simplicity of the apparatus, the ease with which the patient himself can employ it, and the agreeable sen- sation it produces in the muscles, are its best'recommendations. I have had no experience of its. real. utility, but I am assured, on . good authority; that some.of the lamest andthe most painful ‘limbs have been restored by the persevering use of the’ rollet, and nothing velse.’ This little instrument :consists of a wooden rod, nine or ten inches long, and an ‘inch thick, perfectly smooth, on which are placed from four to six. thick rounded and polished rings, of the same material,-an inch anda half in diameter, and so arranged as’ nearly to fit the rod, yet left sufficiently free to.roll over it. and ! History of China, by H, Davis, 2d ed. 12mo. 1836. .~ >’