Thomsonian practice of midwifery : and treatment of complaints peculiar to women and children / By J.W. Comfort, M.D.

  • Comfort, J. W. (John W.)
Date:
1845
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Thomsonian practice of midwifery : and treatment of complaints peculiar to women and children / By J.W. Comfort, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    SECTION VI. CESSATION OF MENSTRUATION. [change of life.] Between the age of forty-five and fifty is the period at which menstruation ceases, and most women believe that at the period of the change of life, as they term it, they are all peculiarly liable to attacks of disease. This, however, is a mistake, or at least there is no evidence that the cessation of the menses is a frequent cause of disease, but on the other hand, the constitution often changes for the better at this period, the woman increas- ing in flesh, and become healthy, when they had been in bad health many years previously. u M. Benoiston de Chateauneuf has recently shown, by extracts from burial registers, that the mortality between the ages of thirty and seventy, is not more considerable amongst women than men. But if the comparative mortality be less than was supposed, there can be no question as to the importance of this period; for in many cases, we find uterine and ovarian disorders dating from thence, and we know that it is about this time that the more ma- lignant diseases commence. How far they may be owing to neglect at this period, it is very difficult to say; we must sup- pose, however, that the anatomical state in which the uterine system is left on the arrest of its function, must exert a certain amount of influence on their production. Symptoms.—In strong and healthy females, the discharge usu- ally diminishes in quantity gradually; and assumes a lighter colour until it disappears altogether, without any appreciable change in the general health. In other instances there will be irregularities in the periods, sometimes there will be no appear- ance for two or three months, and then return again. Women of delicate frame and of nervous temperament are of*
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