A report on the treatment of burns and scalds / drawn up at the request of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association by Samuel Crompton.

  • Crompton, Samuel Willard.
Date:
1851
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A report on the treatment of burns and scalds / drawn up at the request of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association by Samuel Crompton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    REPORT ON SCALDS AND BURNS, In burns of great extent, the universal opinion appears to be that cold applications are improper. Dr. Adams, of Banchory, says,— I would never think of using cold applications when the burning is of great extent, and I have heard of very bad conse- quences from the use of them in such cases by inexperienced persons. In cases of scalds of a limited extent, I would say that I have found nothing answer so well as cold applications. I usually lay a piece of surgeon^s lint over the part, and keep it constantly wetted with cold water, until the heat and stinging pain be effec- tually removed. When this purpose has been accomplished, tepid water, applied in the same manner, will be found more agreeable to the feelings of the patient; but some prefer substituting cotton or flour.''* Mr. Newnham, of Farnham, says,— In burns of great extent, such is the depression of the powers of life, that I question the propriety of cold applications; in burns of a small surface, there may be no objection,-t &c. Mr. Wood, of Rochdale, says:— To begin with the mildest case of burn. A lady, sealing a billet-doux, scorches her finger with the taper; acting, as most ladies do, from impulse, she instantly plunges it into cold water, and in so doing, I maintain that she does the very best thing possible. By alternately plunging it into cold water, and blowing upon it,—by applying cold, in short, she puts a stop to the increased action of the vessels of the part, and consequently to the heat and pain. A surgeon does precisely the same thing by irrigating it with spirit-wash, by means of a little lint wrapped round the little finger. In half-an-hour the case is cured. My next case shall be one where a maid servant unwittingly plunges her hand and arm into a pail of boiling water, or a pan of boiling liquid falls off the fire upon a child on the hearth. Here is a very different case to the former one, and requiring very different treatment. In the child's case especially, the extent of injured surface renders the cold water both locally and constitutionally inadmissible. The patient is already in a state of rigor, and any extensive use of cold water would, in all proba- bility, so depress the powers of life, as to risk the production of sloughing, where otherwise the result would have been merely * Provincial Medical Journal, 1848, p. 42. f -^^« P-