The classification and treatment of diseases commonly known as rheumatism / by Frank E. Peckham.

  • Peckham, Frank E.
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The classification and treatment of diseases commonly known as rheumatism / by Frank E. Peckham. 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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    the process when it attacks the spine where it is most often spoken of as an osteoarthritis. In this location the patient consults a physician at a much earlier stage than when some of the areas of joints are involved. In this stage there is pain on motion of the spine in flexing and side bending which interferes very directly with occupation and from the fact that the spine is in- volved, patients are earlier referred to the orthopedic physician and not so much time is wasted while the condition is treated with the usual anti-rheumatic rem- edies. In the earliest stage hardly any hypertrophy or overgrowth of bone exists, but there is an infiltra- tion of the soft structures which is undoubtedly due to auto-infection (either toxines or bacteria). This thickening is usually confined to one side only in the beginning, and so when the patient stands with back towards the observer, lateral bending shows the spine curved normally to one side and limited in its excur- sion on the other. When both sides are involved the excursion on both sides is limited and usually one side more than the other. Slowly as time goes by, there takes place a deposit of bone salts and if not arrested the vertebrae become fused together in a condition of anchylosis. In this stage which precedes actual bone formation the condition is ordinarily completely cura- ble. The wave current may be applied with long me- tallic electrode, twelve to fourteen inches long, by three inches wide, placed directly over the affected re-