An introductory lecture, intended as a recommendation to a more careful investigation of the constitutional origin of local diseases, on principles deduced from the opinions of Hunter and Abernethy : delivered at the Finsbury Dispensary / by George Macilwain.

Date:
1834
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An introductory lecture, intended as a recommendation to a more careful investigation of the constitutional origin of local diseases, on principles deduced from the opinions of Hunter and Abernethy : delivered at the Finsbury Dispensary / by George Macilwain. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    in the consequently greater number of such cases, and in the control which may be exercised over the habits of the patients, so material in the accurate in- vestigation of the effects of remedies, and in enforcing the prescribed treatment; advantages alike important to the interests of science, and in cases of contem- plated insubordination, to those of the patients also. But again, the large number of pupils, consequent on the monopoly which hospitals enjoy, constitutes practically a material subtraction from some of these advantages. On the contrary side, it is to be ob- served, that many diseases are seen in dispensaries better than in hospitals. The following is a catalogue of diseases, some of which are scarcely seen at all in hospitals, and all of which are seen as well, and for the most part better, in dispensaries. Infantile diseases generally—such as disorders incidental to teething, strophulus, porrigo, small-pox, measles, scarlatina, hooping-cough ; constituting together so important a feature in the occupation of the general practitioner. To these may be subjoined, cutaneous diseases gene- rally, ulcerations of the lower extremities, and dis- eases of the aged ; incipient affections of the joints and of the urinary organs, diseases of the eye, the various disorders connected with uterogestation and lactation, with fever of very variable type and severity. As the legislature is now informed on these points, let us hope that dispensaries will, ere long, be recog- nised as competent fields for instruction. This would increase their usefulness, and add to that of the hos- pitals, by encouraging competition, which is, as I D
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