Reply to a French review of essay LII : essay LVI / by William Sharp.

Date:
1889
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Reply to a French review of essay LII : essay LVI / by William Sharp. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    to learn if Iron would act as well as Titanium, but this had no effect. Titanium was again had recourse to, and in a week there was already great improvement; the dropsy again gradually disappeared, and the albumen, which had increased, was again much reduced in quan- tity. In August of the same year (1867) she wrote to say that she was well. Up to this point the case was reported in Essay XVII. Afterwards I saw her once, and now copy the note then made, “ She looks better than I have yet seen her; no dropsy; there is still albumen.” The Titanium was repeated. Again her letters were, “going on most satisfactorily,” until January, 1868. About this time she lost an excellent mother, went to another part of the Kingdom, and I heard no more from her. So that, though wonderfully benefited, I do not know and cannot say that she was permanently cured. The doses she took were very small quantities of Titanium 1. In the experiments on myself I had taken two grains in each dose. I have no doubt now that Titanium 2 would have done still better. It will be noticed that it is more than twenty years since this case was treated, and at that time I had necessarily much to learn as to how to prescribe Titanium. It is evident that this young lady’s illness was one in which there was far more than a mere perversion of function giving rise to the escape of albumen. There must have been serious, there may have been fatal derangement of structure—anatomical lesion—in the kidneys. While looking at the amount of benefit derived, the apparently dying condition of the patient ought to be remembered. Perhaps it will again be a relief to some of my readers if a short digression is made here, and it will be interest- ing to inquire what we are taught by modern writers as to the occurrence of albuminuria. We are told by Dr. Bristowe that it is met with, “ In many specific fevers, and in other febrile disorders ; in congestion of the kidneys due to heart disease, bronchitis, or obstruc- tion of the renal veins or arteries. The most important causes are inflammation of the kidney, and those various chronic lesions which are comprehended in the term e chronic Bright’s disease.’ ”* # Practice of Medicine, 2nd ed., p. 826.