Nature in disease : an address before the Norfolk District Medical Society of Massachusetts, at the Annual Meeting, May 12, 1852 / by B. E. Cotting ; printed by vote of the Society.

  • Cotting, Benjamin Eddy, 1812-1897.
Date:
1852
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Nature in disease : an address before the Norfolk District Medical Society of Massachusetts, at the Annual Meeting, May 12, 1852 / by B. E. Cotting ; printed by vote of the Society. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

    7/16
    limited nature, have been sufficient to remodel the plans for treatment. This has been done so effectually, that it may now be doubted whether it would not be a disgrace to any one of us not to recognize the principles established by Louis, in our treatment of this and similar diseases. Valuable as these advances have been, the practical inquirer has other and equally-important questions to ask of the observer. Disease has been noted, registered, and counted, under various forms of treatment— what would its history and course be, if left to itself, under no treat- ment at all, without the administration of any drugs, with a view to cut short or even to mitigate its progress ? For this question must receive a distinct and definite answer, from the observation of a sufficient number of cases, before the real value of any method of treatment can be truly f«timateu. It may be said, and with truth, that this is a difficult question to de- cide—that single cases vary greatly in character—that the constitution and state of the patient are not the same, for any two individuals—that in its tendency, severity and complications, each case differs from every other. •^But all this does not alter the proposition, f From such cases we are constantly proclaiming the value of certain remedies, and deducing plausible theories of treatment. Aye, but the experiment—who will be bold enough to try it ? The sin of omission in practice is the unpar- donable of offences. To have tried everything that could be thought of is the impregnable retreat of the baffled practitioner, and a balmy seda- tive to the bereaved. Nevertheless, until the benefits of the prescription over its omission be known, the administration of a drug is as great and as hazardous an experiment as the withholding of it. Who can say with truth that it is not even more dangerous ? The popular reasoning, that it will do no harm if it does no good, may be sufficiently satisfactory to ignorant and officious bystanders, who seem sometimes to literally revel in an opportunity to crowd a patient's stomach with multifarious mix- tures, and to load his person with offensive masses ; but it will hardly bear the test of ordinary common sense. The suffering individual may prefer the trial at any risk, under the irksomeness of debility or the pangs of disease ; but a compliance with his wishes, followed by recovery, is not proof positive that he has been benefited thereby. f A violent fever sets in—you bleed the patient, and administer power- ful drastics. In a few days he is well. Has the disease been broken up ? Might he not have recovered equally well and speedily had he never seen you, or your supposed remedies ? Cases of recovery under similar circumstances, without interference, are not infrequent. And un- til the question can be decided on a large scale—until the degree of pro- 1*