Statistical analysis of one hundred and sixty-six cases of secondary syphilis, observed at the Lock Hospital in the years 1838-39, with observations / by Henry Lee.

  • Lee, Henry, 1817-1898.
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Statistical analysis of one hundred and sixty-six cases of secondary syphilis, observed at the Lock Hospital in the years 1838-39, with observations / by Henry Lee. 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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    STATISTICAL ANALYSIS OF 166 CASES OF SECONDARY SYPHILIS, OBSERVED AT THE LOCK HOSPITAL IN THE YEARS 1838-39, WITH OBSERVATIONS. In Medical Statistics, it frequently happens that favourable results are displayed, whilst others are passed over in silence; false impressions may thus be conveyed, even though the facts published be true. The accuracy of statistical conclusions in medicine may consequently be fre- quently doubted, especially when it is against the interest both of the patients and of the surgeons, that unsuccessful cases should be recorded. Especially with regard to the treatment of disease, are we bound to look with some degree of suspicion upon statistical evidence ; for, although the favourable cases may be fairly enough stated, it can hardly be ex- pected that large numbers of unsuccessful cases, particularly when they have to be collected from different sources, and when the stimulus of success is wanting to fix them upon the attention, can be brought for- ward with the same degree of prominence or fidelity. Valuable, then, as such evidence must always be, and necessary as an appeal to it is in all disputed questions, there must still be a doubt with regard to the conclusions drawn from it, when derived only from successful results. In the accompanying tables, a different plan has been followed, and one which is not liable to these objections. It has been my endeavour to investigate certain points connected with the history of Syphilis, from those cases only where the treatment of the primai-y affection had not been successful in preventing secondary disease. For this puqjose, I have collected, and noted, as accurately as circumstances would permit, all the cases of Secondary affection which presented themselves at the Lock Hospital during the greater portions of the years 1838-39. By analyzing these cases, and observing the different probable causes of fnihire in the treatment of the primary affection, and the relative fre- quency with which particular symptoms followed the mercurial or the