The prophylaxis and treatment of internal diseases : designed for the use of practitioners and of advanced students of medicine / by F. Forchheimer.

  • Forchheimer, F. (Frederick), 1853-1913.
Date:
1906
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The prophylaxis and treatment of internal diseases : designed for the use of practitioners and of advanced students of medicine / by F. Forchheimer. 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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    SECTION IX DISEASES OF THE KIDNEYS I. MOVABLE KIDNEY (v. Enteroptosis) II. ANURIA As this may be the result of obstruction or of faulty function in the kidney, the treatment must differ according to the cause. In the obstructive form the treatment is surgical. In the nonobstructive form the treatment should be adapted to the individual case. The routine practice of giving diuretics is to be deprecated; when we have a kidney so disabled by organic disease that no urine is passed, the principal object of treatment should be to give it rest, not to stimulate it by giving it more work; this is especially the case in the early stages of acute nephritis. Under these circumstances no diuretics—digitalis, sweet spirits of niter, diuretin, squills, etc.—should be used for their effect upon the kidney; when digitalis or caffeine is indicated for the heart, it should be given. In these cases remedies should be used that preserve the kidney and lessen its embarrassment—e. g., sudorifics, cathar- tics—and the quantity of water given should be commensurate with the needs of the economy (v. Treatment of Nephritis). The hyperemia of the kidneys may be relieved by poultices at the back, dry cupping, or hot applications of any sort. The treatment of uraemia (q. v.), which may follow, calls for different measures. When the anuria is due to collapse, as from cholera or after operations, hypodermoclysis, intravenous injections of normal saline solu- tions, besides the ordinary remedies used according to the nature of the collapse, are indicated. Here, especially, hot rectal- irrigations are valuable. In yellow fever (q. v.) the treatment should be used that has been adopted by the native physicians. Hysterical anuria requires little attention; the question of deception must here be taken into consideration; at all events, in the three cases that have come under my observation, a disregard of the symptom by the physician was followed by its disappearance in a short time. In cases of anuria in acute nephritis, Edebohls's operation should be consid- ered (v. Nephritis). III. HEMATURIA The causal therapy cannot be here referred to, as it will be found in the chapters on the various diseases that produce it. Under all circumstances,