A guide to the treatment of diseases of the skin, with suggestions for their prevention : for the use of the student and general practitioner : illustrated by cases / by Thomas Hunt.

  • Hunt, Thomas, 1798-1879.
Date:
1871
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A guide to the treatment of diseases of the skin, with suggestions for their prevention : for the use of the student and general practitioner : illustrated by cases / by Thomas Hunt. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    they are seldom or never curative, scarcely auxiliary to the cure, but they soothe and amuse the patient, who likes to be doing something, and often speaks gratefully of their effects. Sea-water, sulphur-fume and hot-air baths, are all injurious to the inflamed surface, and generally unnecessary when the inflam- mation has been subdued.* Equally needless, and not seldom hurtful, are most of the ointments, lotions, and other applications which have been recommended in these diseases. When the skin is very harsh and disposed to crack or bleed, much comfort may be de- rived from glycerine diluted with five times its volume of orange flower water. Much judgment is sometimes required to fix the proper limits of the antiphlogistic treatment. Ec- thyma, a disease of debility and poverty, has been known to take the place of lepra, and eczema has often degenerated into impetigo when the low-diet system has been carried too far,—a condition which must be rectified by tonics. Indeed, the degree of success attending the alterative treatment will much depend upon the nicety with which we have pre- viously adapted our depleting measures to the actual necessities of the case. If the patient be much re- duced, powerful tonics may be necessary to his reco- very, and there are cases in which they are found requisite from the very commencement of the treat- ment. Both plethora and ancemia are conditions highly unfavourable to the recovery of lost health, and must be removed before the skin can become permanently sound. Among the poor, and especially poor infants and * Tho Turkish or Roman bath, when properly administered, has a value peculiar to itself, which will be noticed in a future chapter.