The management of the eye, ear, and throat / by Henry Power, George P. Field, John S. Bristowe.

  • Power, H. (Henry), 1829-1911.
Date:
[between 1890 and 1899?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The management of the eye, ear, and throat / by Henry Power, George P. Field, John S. Bristowe. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    affection may linger for some time, yet it is satisfactory to feel that it is under control, and that no serious damage to the cornea is to be apprehended. No discouragement need be felt on account of a slight relapse after apparent recovery. The syringing should be recommenced, and it may be ex- pedient to drop into the eye a little weak alum lotion, made by dissolving a fragment of alum the size of a Barcelona nut in a tumblerful of water. The ventilation of the room should be attended to, and the bowels should not be allowed to be confined. A word of caution may be added in regard to the person who syringes. The matter proceeding from the infant’s eye is highly contagious, and the introduction of some of the spray spirted back from the eye has been not unfrequently known to set up acute and serious purulent inflammation in the person using the syringe. There is little risk of this, however, if the stream be not too violently forced out. The total duration of the disease is often six weeks or two months. That purulent ophthalmia is of a contagious nature has long been recognised, and it has even been thought that the material conveying the infection has been obtained. In a severe epidemic of it that occurred in the course of the year 1866 in the Hopital des Enfants, in Paris, the physician in charge, M. Giraldes, desired a gentleman well versed in practical chemistry, M. 0. Reveil, to examine, analyse, and report upon the air of the wards ; and the careful investiga- tion to which this air was subjected showed that it contained globules of pus, together with scales of the skin, which were so dry and light as to float in it, or, at least, to be easily raised on the slightest disturbance of the dust on the floor, or on the admission of a current of air ; and there is