History of the cholera controversy with directions for the treatment of the disease / by Sir George Johnson.

Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: History of the cholera controversy with directions for the treatment of the disease / by Sir George Johnson. 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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    epidemic of 1866. Of these cases 91 were treated with astringents and stimulants, camphor and iced water, applications of ice and hypodermic injections, with a mortality of 71'42 per cent. 87 cases were treated with castor oil, and a liberal use of food and alcohol, with a mortality of 42‘37 per cent. The authors express their belief that food and alcohol given during collapse were injurious, and to some extent counteracted the good eflPects of the evacu- ant treatment. 197 cases were treated with castor oil, receiving little or no food of any kind or alcoholic stimulants until reaction was fairly estab- lished ; of these only 30’4 5 per cent. died. It is stated that the cases which were treated by astringfents and stimulants occurred for the most part at the very outbreak of the epidemic, and amongst an unfavourable class of patients, but at another institution, under the same mode of treat- ment, the mortality continued almost as high during the whole period of the epidemic. Again they say “ the sudden decrease in the death rate which followed the change of treatment pointed to the latter as the cause of the former.” Some interesting tables and details of typical cases are given. For instance, a boy aged ten recovered from collapse of such gravity and with so extreme an arrest of the circulation that he had gangrene of both hands, which necessitated ampu- tation, followed by complete recovery. With regard to diarrhoea, the authors say, “ Our experience was