A practical treatise on the principal diseases of the lungs, considered especially in relation to the particular tissues affected, illustrating the different kinds of cough / by G. Hume Weatherhead.

  • Weatherhead, G. Hume (George Hume), 1790?-1853.
Date:
1837
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A practical treatise on the principal diseases of the lungs, considered especially in relation to the particular tissues affected, illustrating the different kinds of cough / by G. Hume Weatherhead. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

    34/204 (page 18)
    DYSPNCEA—ITS CAUSE. gence deprives the lungs of the increased power and assistance, which a forcible effort of the will contributes to those more advanced in life, in aid- ing them to expectorate the sputa. Hence, we perceive why phlegm should accumulate in the lungs of infants affected with catarrh, independent of the greater quantity secreted, and why death in many instances should occur solely from want of intelligence to aid the natural efforts to expec- torate it. Catarrh in children is distinguished from the coming-on of measles by the greater mildness of the febrile symptoms; otherwise, before the appear- ance of the eruption in the latter, the affection of the mucous membrane of the eyes, nose, and chest, is much the same in both at the beginning. Some degree of difficulty of breathing attends upon catarrh from its earliest stages, and in its mildest form. This symptom, in the first instance, is proportionate to the tumefaction that takes place in the air-passages in consequence of the inflam- mation ; but as the disease proceeds, the secretion of phlegm necessarily augments the dyspnoea by partially or completely filling the air-cells, as well as the air-tubes, more or less. Now, both of these circumstances operate physiologically in the same way in producing the difficulty of breathing. A thickening of the mucous membrane, whether per- manent and organic, or the temporary and casual result of acute inflammation, impedes that change