A course of lectures on medicine to nurses / by Herbert E. Cuff.

  • Cuff, Herbert E. (Herbert Edmund), 1864-1921.
Date:
1920
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A course of lectures on medicine to nurses / by Herbert E. Cuff. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    24/272 (page 12)
    THE USE OF STIMULANTS IN CASES OF ACUTE ILLNESS To-day we are going to consider the position which stimulants occupy in the treatment of acute illnesses, such as pneumonia, enteric fever, etc. In doing so, we shall devote our attention almost exclusively to alcohol, since that is the stimulant which is most commonly used in these cases. At the same time, I must tell you that it is not now prescribed to anything like the extent that it was a few years ago ; indeed, many physicians think that patients do better without it, and decline to use it at all in acute illnesses. The first thing which I wish to impress upon you is that alcohol is a drug, and, like other drugs, becomes a poison if it be administered in improper quantities. Before we can discuss its use in disease we must find out what effect it has upon the body of a healthy individual. (I) As a Food.—Alcohol is not a food in the same way that bread and meat are, and is therefore unable to repair the different tissues of the body and assist in making good the loss they have suffered in the performance of their various functions. It acts, rather, in the same way that fat does, and by being burnt up in the tissues, produces vital force and heat. Both alcohol and fat produce light and heat when put into a fire. They do not, however, help to build up the fire ; they cannot take the place of coal.