On the pathology and treatment of gonorrhœa / by J.L. Milton.

  • Milton, J. L. (John Laws), 1820-1898.
Date:
1884
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the pathology and treatment of gonorrhœa / by J.L. Milton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    very properly too. Consequently the proof most wanted is the most dif- ficult to get. Secondly, we have to separate facts which have been confounded to- gether. For instance, it seems to be assumed by some authors, that when symptoms run high, infecting power must be present. But the two ques- tions are quite distinct. Severity is not evidence of contagious power. Take the case of Swediaur. He gave himself as bad urethritis as a man could well have, by injecting ammonia into the canal, but as evidence of such a disorder being able to infect the female, his experiment is worth- less. Yet who can doubt that some of those who speak of his case have not kept the line of demarcation so clearly in view as they might have done ? Some of the causes assigned may at once be rejected ; they are far too improbable for any rational being. Thus, e.g., Dr. Tanner was present when a surgeon suggested that making water in the night air might bring on gonorrhoea; and Mr. Johnson relates' that a patient wanted the stu- dents at St. George's Hospital to believe that in his case gonorrhoea had been brought on by the exertion of lopping a tree ; he having nothing the matter with him when he began his task, and finding the discharge fully developed when he came down ! A medical man credulous enough to fancy that night air could exert any such influence would not be likely to investigate facts with proper care ; and a patient who had the effrontery to tell such a barefaced false- hood would be just the person to conceal the fact that he had had inter- course with a prostitute. The possibility of late hours, too, having any such effect is one I should be very much inclined to question. It is, there- fore, only against the more probable of these causes that any arguments are directed. It must always be kept in view that many patients are possessed with a desire for finding any reason but the right one. It is not that they wish to deceive the surgeon. Most probably it arises as much as anything from a desire to extenuate the responsibility of the female, or to set up a higher standard for her health and physique than they are entitled to. Be that as it may, it is quite certain ^ that they will snatch at a straw to save their drowning theory, and are only too happy to find the surgeon concur with them in ascribing the disease to such innocent causes as a strain, a cold, etc. Still, making all allowance for bad logic, for the morbid desire to im- j>ose on medical men on the one hand, or on their own judgment on the other, it must be granted that cases of discharge from such causes are met with. And first, I have to urge that a very slight gleet, a tender state of the urethra left behind by a gonorrhoea suffered to die out of itself, or only