The influence of tropical climates on European constitutions: being a treatise on the principal diseases incidental to Europeans in the East and West Indies, Mediterranean, and coast of Africa (Volume 2).

  • James Johnson
Date:
1824
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The influence of tropical climates on European constitutions: being a treatise on the principal diseases incidental to Europeans in the East and West Indies, Mediterranean, and coast of Africa (Volume 2). Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    greater length than the summer fevers, but only dif- fer from them in being accompanied with earlier prostration of strength.'* <• I can safely state, says Dr. Irvine, that the same sort of treatment which' C have used in the summer fever, also proved successful in these, 45. Purging, however, was more neces- sary, and calomel and James's powder were found useful in protracted cases. Touciiing the-mouth with mercury is sometimes useful in cases where the yellowness is great, 47. Tlie winter fevers, according to Irvine, had nothing remarkable in their phenomena or progress ; hut ran a course analogous to the ordinary cases of Synochus in England. They hardly ever fail to yield to the four grand means of topical bleeding, [arteriotomy,] blistering—cold affusion, and purging, 60. To the above observations by Dr. Irvine, which appear, on the whole, judicious and correct, I shall add some from the pen of Mr. Boyle, who, in my opinion, has given a more rational explanation of the symjjtoms, while his Methodus Medendi is equally effective as Dr. Irvine's. When the epidemic first appears, says Mr. Boyle, rn the early part of autumn, the fever preserves nearly a continued form, and only remits after the violence iof the excitement has been subdued. It bears a strong analogy to the bilious remittents of all warm climates —is closely allied to the fever which visits other points of the Mediterranean shores, and seems to differ only in degree from those great endemics which have repeatedly ravaged the western hemisphere. «In Sicily, says Mr. Boyle, this fever usually makes its appearance about the same time that cho- lera morbus and other disorders of the biliary organs are known to pi-evail, and botli diseases seem to arise from causes of nearly a similar nature. It indeed appears to be essential to the production of this fever that a considerable diminution of temperature, accom- Vox. II. 4
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