Practical observations on diseases of the lungs and heart / By Archibald Billing.

  • Billing, Archibald, 1791-1881.
Date:
MDCCCLII. [1852]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Practical observations on diseases of the lungs and heart / By Archibald Billing. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

    52/150 (page 44)
    will produce cough; and a relaxed elongated uvula, it is commonly known, induces a most distressing* continued cough: and in all these coughs, when long continued, the membrane of the larynx and trachea, inflamed by mechanical irritation, gives out extra mucus, thus producing* expectoration, with occasion- ally even streaks of blood. Such cases occur both in males and females, giving rise to suspicion of consumption; hut the most common cause in females is hysteria, often so slight that scarcely any, if any, discoverable irregularity or derangement of the functions of the uterus is evident, and yet the resulting morbid sensibility of the bronchi and larynx, produces cough, with alarming symptoms, not merely ex- pectoration, as in the cases just alluded to, and which is chiefly from the continued mechanical irritation of the cough, but also spitting of blood, the occurrence of which gives additional cause of apprehension of consumption. The mode of treat- ment of the former cases is obvious to all medical men as soon as the cause is discovered, according to the old adage; and, as to the latter, I have found no difficulty in curing this imagined consumption by directly attacking the primary disease with such remedies as turpentine, iron, cubebs, aloes, quinine, assafoetida, &c.; and anodynes, with squills, &c., to allay the morbid sensibility of the bronchi and larynx; at the same time supporting* the strength by animal food and fermented liquors, which are too often forbidden, from the practitioner supposing the symptoms to depend on inflammation, instead of attributing them to the true cause, morbid sensi-