An essay on the chemical history and medical treatment of calculous disorders / [Alexander Marcet].

  • Marcet, Alexander, 1770-1822
Date:
1819
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An essay on the chemical history and medical treatment of calculous disorders / [Alexander Marcet]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    170/266 (page 152)
    Probable limits of the powers of medi- cine. CHAP. VIII. OF THE MEDICAL TREATMENT OF CALCULOUS DISORDERS f AND OF THE CHEMICAL AND PHYSIOLOGICAL PRIN- CIPLES CONNECTED WITH THE SUBJECT. QN my entering upon this subject, I think it necessary to premise, that, in endeavouring to apply chemical principles to this branch of medical practice, no rea- sonable expectation can be entertained that calculi lodged in the urinary organs, and already too large to be discharged by the natural passages, can be actually dissolved by any mode of internal treatment. The only benefit which we may with any confidence expect from medicine in this disease is,either to prevent the increase of calculi already formed, or, what is still more important, to guard the constitution of those who are sub- ject to the disorder, against the prevalence of the particular diathesis from which it arises. But although we cannot materially affect large concretions by medicines, on ac- count of the powerful resistance which the