Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Lectures on the theory and practice of physic (Volume 1). 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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![tation. We have facts to show that most decided advantage may arise from the application of leeches, even where the symptoms of gastritis are absent.* Chronic Gastritis. — We come now to consider chronic gastritis, an extremely interesting disease, whether we look upon it with reference to its importance, its frequency, or its Protean character. It is commonly called dyspepsia, and this term, loose and unlimited in its acceptation, often proves a stumbling-block to the student in medicine. Dyspepsia, you know, means difficult digestion, a cir- cumstance which may depend on many causes, but perhaps on none more frequently than upon chronic gastritis. In the great majority of dyspeptic cases the exciting cause has been over-stimulation of the stomach, either from the constant excess in strong, highly-sea- soned meats, or indulging in the use of exciting liquors. Persons who feed grossly, and drink deeply, are generally the subjects of dyspepsia ; by constantly stimulating the stomach they produce an inflammatory condition of that organ. Long-continued functional lesion will eventually produce more or less organic disease ; and you will find that in most cases of old dyspepsia there is more or less gastritis. But let us go farther, and inquire whether those views are borne out by the ordinary treatment of dyspeptic cases. When you open a book on the practice of physic, and turn to the article dyspepsia, one of the first things which strikes you is the vast num- ber of cures for indigestion. The more incurable a disease is, and the less we know of its treatment, the more numerous is the list of remedies, and the more empirical is its treatment. Now, the cir- cumstance of having a great variety of cures for a disease, is a strong proof, either that, there is no real remedy for it, or that its nature is very little understood. A patient afflicted with dyspepsia will generally run through a variety of treatment, he will be ordered bark by one practitioner, mercury by another, purgatives by a third ; in fact, he will be subjected to every form of treatment. Now all this is proof positive that the disease is not sufficiently understood. What does pathology teach in such cases ? In almost every instance where patients have died with symptoms of dyspepsia, pathological anatomy proves the stomach to be in a state of demonstrable dis- ease. It appears, therefore, that, whether we look to the uncer- tainty and vacillations of treatment, or the results of anatomical ex- amination, the case is still the same ; and that, where dyspepsia has been of considerable duration, the chance is that there is more or less of organic disease, and that, if we prescribe for dyspepsia, • [In my own practice, in former years, I have met repeatedly with gastritis in women brought on by the secret use of mixed liquors, cordials, &c. In one of these cases the attack was exceed- ingly severe, requiring the most energetic means for relief. As too often happens, I was kept, at the time, in entire ignorance of its cause. Those vile compounds, true poisons, sold and drunk by the common people, and in greater proportion by females, under the name of cordials, arc, to my knowledge, frequently causes of gas- tritis, both acute and chronic. — B.]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21156955_0137.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
