Observations on the principal medical institutions and practice of France, Italy, and Germany : with notices of the universities, and cases from hospital practice : to which is added an appendix, on animal magnetism and homœopathy / by Edwin Lee.

  • Lee, Edwin, -1870.
Date:
1837
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the principal medical institutions and practice of France, Italy, and Germany : with notices of the universities, and cases from hospital practice : to which is added an appendix, on animal magnetism and homœopathy / by Edwin Lee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    regularity, and inclosing spacious gardens and grounds for exercise. The population amounts to six thousand individuals, the greater part consisting of aged and infirm females, the remainder of patients ot the same sex afflicted with mental alienation,epileptic and cancerous diseases. The inmates sleep in large wards, containing from thirty to sixty beds, which however are placed too close to each other. The meals are served up in the wards, there being no dining-rooms. Those who require medical attendance are transferred to the infirmary, containing two hundred and fifty beds, which are mostly occupied by cases of chronic gastric, and bronchial affections, diseases of the heart, and paralysis. The number of insane patients averages from nine hundred to one thousand. This department of the establishment has been much- improved of late years, owing in great measure to the exertions formerly made by the venerable Pinel. The patients are classed in three divisions, viz. curable, incurable, and idiots. The medical superintendence of the first division is confided to M. Pariset, of the second to M. Mitivie, of the third to M. Falret. Tranquil patients, and those under treatment, are lodged in clean and airy wards, each containing from twenty to forty beds. Of the incu- rable, the more intractable and furious patients, some occupy wards, others small cells built round court-yards on the ground-floor. Each of the cells lodges one person, contains no other furniture than a bed, and has a grated window with a shutter. When violent, the patient is confined to her cell, and the shutter closed; the isolation and darkness is often sufficient to restore quiet, without resorting to the straight waist- coat, which is the only means of forcible restraint employed. In general, however, the patients walk about the courts in the day-time, and are superintended by females, who appear to treat them with kindness and gentleness. Moral measures are not much employed in the treatment, which chiefly consists in the use of mild purgatives, baths, douches, and counter irritation by means of blisters. In some cases of maniacal ex- altation, cauterisation of the nape of the neck is used with very advantageous results. Sanguineous depletion is not frequently resorted to, nor are opium and other sedatives often employed. There is a separate ward for convalescents, who employ their time in reading and sewing. Another ward is appropriated to the paralytic patients. The paralysis supervening on mental alienation is mostly of a general nature in which the faculty of volition first appears to partake of the debility of the intellectual powers. Its approach is generally indicated by loss of memory and confusion of ideas ; the tongue and muscles of the mouth then become affected, and the inferior extremities are, soon afterwards unable to support the body. M. Pariset does not employ depletion or debilitating measures in these cases—counter irritation and the nux vomica are also inefficacious. Paralysis most frequently supervenes in elderly persons, who have been long insane. Bicltre* is an institution for the male sex, similar to the Salpetriere situate two leagues from Paris. Its population is about three thousand' persons, including the insane. Two physicians and a surgeon have * Formulaire des Hopitaux.