Researches on phthisis: anatomical, pathological and therapeutical / by P. C. A. Louis.

  • Pierre Charles Alexandre Louis
Date:
1844
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Researches on phthisis: anatomical, pathological and therapeutical / by P. C. A. Louis. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    Case II. A street-organ player, aged 22, of moderately- strong constitution, middle height, and quick temper, was ad- mitted into the Hospital of La Charite, the 24th April, 1824. He had been ill for a year and eight months, ceased to follow his occupation, for the last year, and kept his bed from time to time the last three weeks. He ascribed his illness to having drunk a glass of cold water when heated. His earliest symp- tom had been dry cough, with oppressed breathing; no expec- toration occurred until the second month, nor, until the last eight days, had there been any hemoptysis. At this period, while walking quietly, the patient was seized, without previous fit of coughing or any assignable cause, with sudden hemop- tysis, so violent that, according to his statement, he vomited twenty-foui' ounces of blood in less than twenty minutes; after which the sputa had only been more or less deeply tinged red. He had had rigors, heat, and perspirations for the last nine months. The appetite had failed but very slightly, although the cough frequently brought on vomiting. There had been attacks of diarrhoea, each of a few days' dm'ation, at long in- tervals. He began to lose flesh from the outset. August 25th. Present state. Marked emaciation; skin, especially that of the face, slightly yellowish; oppression of breathing moderate; cough not frequent; sputa opaque, tinged with blood or of mahogany colour,—^the patient fancied he felt them detach themselves from the left side of the chest, and at each jar caused by the cough experienced a slight pain (which had existed from the commencement) at the lower part of the same side. Percussion dull over a surface two inches and four lines [6 centimeters] high, under the right clavicle, and in the entire region corresponding to the upper lobe on the left side. In these situations there was manifest pecto- riloquy with tracheal respiration, accompanied on the left side with abundant gurgling. Between the shoulders similar signs were discovered by auscultation. The pulse was rather rapid, small, and weak ; the skin rather below than above the natural temperature; the appetite moderate, no unnatural thirst; di- gestion easily performed; the abdomen yielding and free from pain; one stool of good consistence daily. Pectoral ptisan; gum jJotion; quarter of house allowance, ivithout wine.