Domestic medicine : or, a treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases by regimen and simple medicines. With an appendix containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitioners. ... to which are added, some important observations concerning sea-bathing, and the use of the mineral waters; with many other additions / by William Buchan.

  • Buchan William, 1729-1805.
Date:
1805
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Domestic medicine : or, a treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases by regimen and simple medicines. With an appendix containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitioners. ... to which are added, some important observations concerning sea-bathing, and the use of the mineral waters; with many other additions / by William Buchan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    tne new motions which commence at the birth, as the circulation of the whole mafs of blood through the lungs, refpiration, the periftaltic motion, &c. afford another ftrong argument for keeping the body of an infant free from all prellure. 1 hefe organs, not having been acculfomed to move, are eafily flopped ; but when this happens, death mud enfue. Hardly any method could be devifed more effe&ually to Hop thefe motions, than bracing the body too tight with rollers * and bandages. Were thefe to be applied in the Hue manner to the bodv of an adult for an equal length f time, they would hardly fail to hurt the digeflion and make him Tick. H >w much more hurtful thev muit prove to the tender bodies of infants, we fhall leave any one to judge. Whoever confiders thefe things, will not be furprifed that fo many children die of convulftons foon after the birth. Thefe fits are generally attributed to feme in- ward caufe ; but, in fact, they oftener proceed from our own imprudent conduct. 1 nave known a child feized with convulfion-fits foon after the widwife had done fwaddling it, who, upon taking off the rollers and ban- dages, was immediately relieved, and never had the difeafe afterwards. Numerous examples of this might be given, were they necelfary. It would be fafer to fallen the clothes of an infant with firings than pins, as thefe ofren gall and irritate their tender fkins, and occafion diforders. Tins have been found flicking above half an inch into the body of a child, after it had died of convulfion fits, which in all probability proceeded from that caufe. Children are not only hurt by the tightnefs of their clothes, but alfo by the quantity. Every child has fame degree of fever after the birt h ; and if it be loaded with too many clothes, the fever mu ft: be increafed. But this is not all; the child is generally laid in bed * This is by no means inveighing againft a thing that does not happen. In many parts of Britain at this day, a roller, eight or ten feet in length, is applied tightly round the child's body as foon as it is born. . , with