On surgical diseases of women / by I. Baker Brown.

  • Isaac Baker Brown
Date:
1866
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On surgical diseases of women / by I. Baker Brown. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    371/468 (page 307)
    with progressive increase of the disease, and in which the operation has been followed by marked beneficial results; and in the majority of the most successful of my cases bromide of potassium has not been used. In that numerous class of cases comprised under the terms hysteria and spinal irritation, the operation is almost invariably successful, while the bromide of potassium seldom affords the slightest relief. To return to our subject:—-The general disorder of the health which arises from self-induced irritation of the clitoris requires to be particularly noted, as well as certain character- istic appearances of the genital organs. The period when such disorder attacks the patient is about the age of puberty, and from that time up to almost every age the following train of symptoms may be observed, some being more or less marked than others in the various cases. The patient becomes restless and excited, or melancholy and retiring; listless and indifferent to the social influences of domestic life. She will be fanciful in her food, sometimes express even a distaste for it, and apparently (as her friends will say) live upon nothing. She will always be ailing, and complaining of different affections. At first, perhaps, dys^ pepsia and sickness will be observed; then pain in the head and down the spine; pain, more or less constant, in the lower part of the back, or on either side in the lumbar region, There will be wasting of the face and muscles generally; the skin sometimes dry and harsh, at other times cold and clammy. The pupil will be occasionally firmly contracted, but generally much dilated. This latter symptom, together with a hard cord-like pulse, and a constantly moist palm, are, my son informs me, considered by Mr. Moore, Colonial Surgeon of South Australia, pathognomonic of this condition. There will be quivering of the eyelids, and an inability to look one straight in the face. On inquiring further, disturbance or irregularity in the uterine functions is found, there being either complete cessation of the catamenia, or too frequent periods, generally attended with pain; constant leucorrhoea also commonly existing. To these symptoms in the single female will be added, in x 2