On slight ailments : and on treating disease / by Lionel S. Beale.
- Lionel Smith Beale
- Date:
- MDCCCXC [1890]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: On slight ailments : and on treating disease / by Lionel S. Beale. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.
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![as possible irrespective of the ruin that may be wrought as regards other interests. THE TREATMENT OF SLIGHT AILMENTS CONDUCTED ON THE SAME ; PRINCIPLES AS THAT OF SERIOUS DISEASES. There is also this‘very cogent reason which impels me to direct your attention thus early in my course to the consideration of slight ailments. Many of the principles upon which the treatment of even trivial derangements is conducted obtain in the management of graver ' maladies, and in not a few instances you will find that attention to the j] relief of slight ailments will afford you great assistance in determining the proper course to pursue in the treatment of very serious forms of acute disease. For example, I shall be able to show you that the ^ treatment of a grave disorder like acute rheumatism is based upon facts and reasoning which apply equally to slight affections of a rheu- matic character. Fevers and inflammations of the very slightest degree afford lessons of the greatest value concerning the management of every disease of this class. i By carefully observing the action of remedies in slight ailments, we may gain valuable knowledge. And especially in the treatment of slight derangements of our own health may we hope to acquire definite infor- i mation concerning the precise action of some of the most important of the medicines we employ. I am sure that any one who has experienced ^ the change in his sensations which occurs after taking a few doses of ammonia in the course of an ordinary cold, or has noticed the pleasant 1 alteration which takes place during an attack of quinsy as soon as ] diuretic and sudorific remedies have begun to act, or is practically acquainted with the relief afforded in biliousness, certain forms of indigestion, and sick headache by half or even a quarter of a grain of gray powder or calomel, will not only be convinced of the usefulness of the drugs, but will not altogether despise the views and practice of fifty years ago. Nor will he succumb to the nonsense of giving coloured - water to his suffering contemporaries, or suggest that a number of cases of different forms of disease should be left without any medical treatment whatever, in order that what has been naively termed the “ natural history of disease ” may be studied,—the patient, of course, being persuaded not to complicate the interesting inquiry by longing for the relief of his suffering or for convalescence too quick for leisurely observation of the changes in the symptoms. There are many valuable points connected with prescribing, which are of the utmost consequence, and which are to be learnt from the practitioner who is well acquainted with the management of slight ailments. I have often heard the remark that our predecessors knew](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2130340x_0076.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
