Johnson's family physician : from the ablest medical authorities, giving numerous and dangerous diseases to which the human race is subject, the symptoms and treatment, or what is necessary to be done in an emergency for the patient before the physician arrives, thereby alleviating suffering and often saving life / by E. Darwin Hudson, with articles from the most eminent physicians, among whom are Willard Parker [and others].
- Hudson, E. Darwin (Erasmus Darwin), Jr., 1843-1887.
- Date:
- 1880
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Johnson's family physician : from the ablest medical authorities, giving numerous and dangerous diseases to which the human race is subject, the symptoms and treatment, or what is necessary to be done in an emergency for the patient before the physician arrives, thereby alleviating suffering and often saving life / by E. Darwin Hudson, with articles from the most eminent physicians, among whom are Willard Parker [and others]. 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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![the spasm of the muscles. Great care should be taken for a long time lest a relapse should occur. The food of convalescents should be of the very lightest and blandest character for some days. Chorera Infan^tum, or Acute Intes'tinal Catarrh'. This intense and dangerous form of infant diarrhoea is mostly found in hot climates, the hot season, and close air; more amongst the poor than the rich. The usual cause is improper feeding in hot weather. The former is a direct injury ; the latter, by debilitating the nervous system and lower- ing the functions of all the digestive organs, diminishes the general strength and power of endurance. Nursing infants are but sel- dom affected; many infants will recover from an attack by being returned to the mother's or nurse's breast. Still, an improper con- dition of breast-milk (an undue proportion of water, or fat, or caseine, or the admixture of medicinal agents taken by the mother or nurse, or a change produced by mental emo- tions in the latter) is known to be injurious. Weaned infants, however, and such as are brought up on artificial food, are mostly attacked. Artificial food is seldom identical, in its nutritive value, with mother's milk. Cow's milk contains less sugar and more butter and caseine than mother's milk, and requires cooking and skimming before being diluted with water (better still, barley-water). Vegetable food is dangerous unless carefully selected and prepared. Thus it is that the first passages in cholera infantum contain un- digested food of all sorts, particularly lumps of coagulated milk, which is also brought up by vomiting. Afterwards the passages are very thin, watery, of an acid or fetid smell, very copious and frequent; vomiting accom- panies this diarrhoea, more or less. Moan- ing and crying are soon replaced by debility, and even complete collapse; the body is rapidly deprived of a large portion of the Avater contained in it, and emaciates; the eyes lie deep in the orbits ; the sutures and fontanelles of the skull sink; the skin be- comes dry, the feet and hands cold, while the temperature of the trunk is rising; the face looks shrunk and senile; the pulse be- comes weak and frequent, the voice feeble, the expression of eyes and face listless, and stupor or coma or convulsions set in. Death is a frequent result. The principal preven- tive consists in supplying the well infant with proper artificial food when no breast- milk is available, and at regular times, and in attending to its general health. When the disease has made its appearance the principal means of checking it are the fol- lowing: during the first few (3-6-8) hours no food or drink ought to be given. The irritated stomach must be kept at rest; vomiting will cease on that condition only. After that time give a teaspoonftil of ice- water or a small piece of ice (size of a bean), with or without a few drops of brandy, every five or ten minutes, as long as the tendency to vomit persists. When feeding is to be recommended, avoid milk (except breast- milk) in whatever form. Barley-water, oat- meal gruel (strained), in tea or tablespoonful doses, now and then, with the white of eggs (1-3 in twenty-four hours), will readily be taken and well digested. Many cases will get well with this dietetical treatment. At the same time the air must be kept as cool and fresh as possible, day and night. The infant will recover faster out of than in doors. The medicinal treatment, which is, under all circumstances, the domain of a physician, varies according to the nature of the case. Mercurial remedies (calomel) can be avoided. Subnitrate of bismuth, with opium in small doses, and preparations of chalk, nitrate of silver, astringents, such as tannic or gallic acids, catechu, are frequently resorted to, the latter principally in cases which threaten to become chronic. Cholera Morbus, acute gastro-intestinal catarrh in the adult. It is chiefly caused by errors of diet during the summer season, the stomach and intestines being irritated by indigestible food, acrid juices of fruits, or cold liquids at a time when the body is overheated. Vomiting, purging, paroxysms of painful colic, physical prostration, are the chief symptoms. Relief is obtained by ano- dynes, stimulants, warm enemata, and ex- ternal use of mustard draughts and hot water. Chore'a [Gr. xopeia, a dance], or St. Vitus's Dance, a disease characterized by irregular, involuntary, and often grotesque muscular action, without appreciable organic change in any tissue, and generally without pain or any known derangement of mental action or of sensation. It is most common in children after the second dentition and before puberty; much more common in girls than in boys; sometimes attacks pregnant women and other adults, though some cases once called adult chorea would now be recog- nized as locomotor ataxy, a very different disease. Chorea is sometimes hereditary, sometimes epidemic. Many writers have classed the dancing mania (the original St. Vitus's dance), tarantism, and the strange excesses of certain religionists (dervishes, French prophets, jumpers, and convul- sionists) all as varieties of chorea. Stam- mering has been called a chorea of the vocal organs. The disease is sometimes associated with rheumatism and with anaemia. Such complications should receive special treat- ment. The metallic tonics are generally](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21131041_0021.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
