Pneumonia and typhoid fever : a study.

  • Page, C. E. (Charles Edward), 1840-
Date:
1891
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Pneumonia and typhoid fever : a study. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    erroneously called, is incipient pneumonia. It rep- resents always the co7idition of the person,—what he has acciumilated — not what he hdiS caught. If his condition is sufficiently bad, and the disorder is neglected or badly treated, the result is likely to be full-fledged pneumonia. In this case, there is not ovXygefierali^vQr, as in typhoid fever, but there is a terrible heal lesion in the lungs, which are gorged with blood. The tissues of the blood- vessels of the lungs being relaxed, these vessels are stretched to abnormal size, and filled to a degree that not only checks the onward flow of the blood, but partially, sometimes completely, closes the air-vessels ; and if this condition is not speedily changed, life is extinguished for lack of the ex- change between the used-up gases of the vital system and the atmosphere. It is here that the mustard plaster, or, worse still, the hot poultice, does its deadly work. The latter, if applied to the chest of the most robust man, confined in bed, in a close room, would positively tend to produce, and if continued indefinitely could hardly fail to produce, this lung fever/' Yet, strangely enough, this is a prominent feature in the treatment of pneumonia by most physicians. Such treatment may seem rational from the stand-point of homoeopathy, but its absurdity ought to be evident to the minds of