Therapeutic electricity and practical muscle testing / by W.S. Hedley.

  • Hedley, W. S. (William Snowdon)
Date:
1899
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Therapeutic electricity and practical muscle testing / by W.S. Hedley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    trodes. If a gap be made in any part of the metallic circuit, each time there is a spark across the gap painless muscular contraction is produced. A third method is the method by condensation (Fig. 44). The person under treatment in this, ease constitutes one armature of a condenser, the other armature being near* Currents of 300 m.a. may, under this arrangement, pass through the body. For currents of high frequency, intensity is measured by means of a thermometer empirically graduated by measuring with the amperemeter a current of low frequency. The physiological effects of such currents are found to be as follows : Physiological 1- Analgesia at the point of entry and exit of the current. therapeutic 2 A fa]1 °f arterial tension- effects. 8. Increased action of the skin. 4. Increase in the respiratory combustions. 5. The virulence of blue pus is attenuated, and after about half an hour's application the bacillus dies. It has further been shown that an active diphtheritic toxine through which such currents are passed loses its toxicity; a result due, perhaps, to the molecular shaking to which the culture is sub- jected by the passage of a current of such high frequency of alternation.f In a communication made to the Academy of Sciences, Paris, August, 1897, it is claimed for this current: (1) that it facilitates the elimination of waste products by the kidney; (2) that it increases the activity of the organic combustions; (3) that it tends to bring about a return to the normal ratio between uric acid and urea. Speaking generally, its effect in suitable cases is to improve the general condition, nutrition, and tone of the body, to restore appetite, sleep, and diges- tion, to induce an increasing energy and capacity for work. It has given negative results in neurasthenia, hysteria, and neuritis, but has proved useful in chronic l'heumatism, gouti- ness, obesity, asthma, anaamia, and diabetes. It is essentially * A sheet of metal below the cushion of the couch. f Communication made to the National Society of Physics, 1897.
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