The Bath waters : their uses and effects in the cure and relief of various chronic diseases / By James Tunstall, M.D.

  • Tunstall, James, -1880.
Date:
1850
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Bath waters : their uses and effects in the cure and relief of various chronic diseases / By James Tunstall, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    in which the lumbar muscles, or those of an entire limb, are deficient in nervous power or energy. It must be remembered that natural and artificial warm baths are means of cure in almost every case in which the application of electro-galvanism is re- quired, so that by its combination with the warm bath, we are using two agents combined in a useful and not unpleasant manner.” The advantages derivable from this plan of treat- ment I have repeatedly seen. They are obvious when we consider that, in the water medium, the electric current is diffused over a larger portion of surface—that a succession of severe shocks is not produced—that a larger number of minute nerves are called into action without painful feelings—and that we are enabled to transfer the current to every portion of the body at will. Thus we can produce all the good effects of galvanism in a warm and invigorating medium, itself one of the means of eure ; and the poor suffering paralytic, who is or- dered to have his spine galvanized, is not compelled to sit shivermg and- half naked in a chair, but, getting into the thermal water, he enjoys the grate- ful feelings of the bath with the agreeable return of sensation in the affected limbs produced by a duly regulated electric current. He enters the bath dispirited with his helpless condition; he leaves it with renewed feelings of vigour: a perspiration which invigorates, rather than reduces, breaks out upon his brow, his appetite becomes keen, his strength improves, and he gradually throws off the debilitating disease. N