Proceedings of the Westminster Medical Society. Nos. 1-3 (session 1848-1849).

  • Westminster Medical Society (London, England)
Date:
[1848-1849]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Proceedings of the Westminster Medical Society. Nos. 1-3 (session 1848-1849). 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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    matters, differing in each individual case, according to the severity of the symptoms; and the third stage, indicative of reaction. When alluding to the question of contagion, the autlior stated that, although the disease did not usually spread from person to person so rapidly as scarlatina, small-pox, or measles, it was very analogous, in reference to the mode by which it may be communi- cated, to typhus fever, erysipelas, &c. A patient labouring under typhus, when conveyed into a good-sized and well-ventilated apart- ment, he stated, would rarely communicate the disease to the attendants; whereas, the same patient, placed in an unfavourable locality, and surrounded by poverty and distress, would very pro- bably spread the disease to those persons in attendance at the sick bed. Cholera he believed to be contagious, and that it had been traced to spread in accordance with the ordinary laws of contagion. The frequent immunity from the disease of the professional and other attendants, he considered no proof of the non-contagious nature of the disease, for the same objection might be adduced by every ex- perienced practitioner against the contagiousness of any of the acknowledged infectious diseases. The Central Board of Health had acted, he considered, most injudiciously in issuing their mani- festo for the information of the public, in which they state that no danger is to be apprehended from cholera spreading in consequence of the association of the healthy with the sick. The leading symptoms of the disease, the mode of its fatal ter- mination, and more especially the spontaneous favourable termina- tion occasionally observed, under every variety of treatment, all tend, in the author's opinion, to assimilate it to the effects of poisons on the animal economy. However great the obscurity may be which overhangs the ques- tion respecting the generation or exciting cause of cholera, he stated that most satisfactory evidence can be adduced to prove that many circumstances predispose the human body to its influence, and render it more than usually susceptible of the disease. Those who exceed in spirits and wines—in fruits and unwholesome food— the debilitated from any cause—the poor, who live in unhealthy, badly-drained, and ill-ventilated residences—and especially those who have suffered from previous diarrhoea, rarely escape when the pestilence prevails. V'Thfeauthor next proceeded to detail the post-mortem appearances which'te' had observed in several fatal cases of the disease. In those wil&rdied during the algide stage, the body had undergone great diminution in bulk, and become almost as emaciated as a body in the last stage of consumption; the peculiar blue colour of the skin frequently disappeared shortly after death; the temperature of the surface of one or two bodies increased for a short time after death; quiverings of the muscles, and sometimes even distinct movements of the limbs took place for an hour or two after all signs of animation had departed. The shrivelled appearance of the hands resembled those of a washerwoman. In the chest, in most of the caaes, slight effusions of blood were