A medical guide for the invalid to the principal watering places of Great Britain : containing a view of the medicinal effects of water, 1. As applied to the body in its simple state. 2. As exhibited in its impregnated or mineral form. 3. As employed in this form for the cure of particular diseases, with their modes of treatment, and 4. As assisted in its effects by the situation and climate of the watering-places resorted to / by William Nisbet, M.D.

  • Nisbet, William, 1759-1822.
Date:
1804
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A medical guide for the invalid to the principal watering places of Great Britain : containing a view of the medicinal effects of water, 1. As applied to the body in its simple state. 2. As exhibited in its impregnated or mineral form. 3. As employed in this form for the cure of particular diseases, with their modes of treatment, and 4. As assisted in its effects by the situation and climate of the watering-places resorted to / by William Nisbet, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    it should be chosen as soft as possible, and as free from adventitious mixtures. The effects produced by the use of hard water have not been fully ascertained j they have been supposed indeed as the cause of calculous complaints, though this is by no means sufficiently established. In considering water as a drink, we are to judge of it entirely by the degree of its solvent powers ; and on this idea, soft water is certainly to be preferred, as all animal, vegetable, and saline matter is easier dissolved by it out of the body than by, the other. Indeed, in many instances hard water is known to pro- duce dyspeptic symptoms in them Uiat possess an irri- table state of the stomach, particularly women and children. On these accounts the softer water is to be used as a medicine, and it will be found particularly useful in affections of the stomach and bowels: these complaints originate for the most part in irregularities in diet, par- ticularly from excess. Though abstinence is, in many cases, the proper remedy, yet few patients can be found capable of submitting for any length of time to strong privations of. accustomed indulgence. In place of it, therefore, nothing can be substituted so useful as a pro- per supply of diluents, since they correct the- cause from which the disease proceeds, as far as it can be done. The constant and habitual addition of a large quantity of water, in divided doses, is therefore the best prescrip- tion that can be offered. It will remove the effect of excess of alijyient, as well as its too great stimulus, and B 5 wash