Neuralgia : its various forms, pathology, and treatment : being the Jacksonian prize essay of the Royal college of surgeons for 1850 : with some additions / by C. Toogood Downing.

  • Downing, C. Toogood (Charles Toogood)
Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Neuralgia : its various forms, pathology, and treatment : being the Jacksonian prize essay of the Royal college of surgeons for 1850 : with some additions / by C. Toogood Downing. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    In some few instances, an alternation between the two disorders may be observed; the one giving place to the other in rapid succession. This was very remarkable in the case of a poor man some time since under my care. He had palsy of one side of the face, in conjunction with tic douloureux. The one succeeded the other perfectly several dis- tinct times. Whenever the neuralgic paroxysm took place there was no distortion of the features; but as soon as the pain had ceased, the same hideous disfigurement returned. The poor fellow was relieved ultimately of both the ailments. These various circumstances, while they esta- blish a close connexion between partial palsy and neuralgia, indicate some very different pathological condition; the one showing a too great, the other a too little vitality or functional excitement in the nerve. In both cases, we may suppose that the ex- citing lesion has consisted in some form oi pressuT'e on the nerve, either at its root or in some part of its course; such as would arise from inflammatory swelling of the surrounding tissues, or effusion into them. Wlien the pain follows the numbness, this pressure has apparently ceased; but it has increased to the extent of totally impeding the function of the nerve, when perfect paralysis has supervened on the local excitement. Or it may be, that in the latter