Family thermometry : a manual of thermonetry, for mothers, nurses, hospitalers, etc., and all who have charge of the sick and of the young / by Edward Seguin.

  • Seguin, Edward, 1812-1880.
Date:
1873
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Family thermometry : a manual of thermonetry, for mothers, nurses, hospitalers, etc., and all who have charge of the sick and of the young / by Edward Seguin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    20/84 (page 14)
    have found that the temperature of some one of their family reaches three degrees above zero (thus v^ritten (A)^ or one degree and a half below it (T. 5); and relin- quish to him all responsibility, as soon as these alarms are in figures written. To those women, the thermome- ter has rendered all the service it can, in warning them of the precise point at which they cease to be adequate to the task of taking care of the patient; and that is right. Let every one go as far as her comprehension goes; do not ask a step more, it would be a mis-step. But for those who feel able to help their physician by adding to their good nursing the recording of the movement of the temperature during his absence—a record which is so necessary to guide his future action— and for the other women who happen to be so situated as to be deprived of medical assistance, and still must take care of their sick; for these intelligent and reso- lute persons, like yourself, Madam, the following instruc- tions are written. After taking the temperature correctly, the next thing is to record it correctly. For one cannot make sev- eral thermometric observations without feeling that, to find out their correlative meanings, they must be com- puted and recorded with a strict accuracy. This accuracy is obtained by an arrangement of charts, on which are noted the temperature, the pulse^ and the respiration, morning and evening, or oftener. This material process of nursing under the light of thermometry, is so important, that I put off the consid- eration of its results in order to show its mechanism. It is a kind of book-keeping of the three vital signs, tem- perature, pulse, and respiration, under the title of