Remarks on the history and treatment of delirium tremens / [John Ware].

  • Ware, John, 1795-1864
Date:
1831
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Remarks on the history and treatment of delirium tremens / [John Ware]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    of mind. In a few hours, however, the delirium re¬ turned, and he died in about forty-eight hours from the first attack of convulsions. * In the second case, the disease, though finally as¬ suming all the peculiar symptoms of Delirium Tre¬ mens, and occurring in a person who had once suf¬ fered from it, did not exhibit itself in an unmixed form. His symptoms were at first irregular, and arose, as I conjectured, from a combination with in¬ flammation of the brain, but they assumed finally the aspect of genuine Delirium Tremens. After one or two days of delirium, and a night passed without sleep, he became, for nearly a whole day, perfectly rational. This relief followed venesection and the free operation of cathartic medicines, but was not preceded by sleep, and was not relied on as affording a favorable prognosis. The symptoms accordingly returned with increased violence, and with a more close resemblance to Delirium Tremens. Sleep was procured by laudanum, but without any relief of the other symptoms, and the case terminated fatally. The tremor which has given its name to this dis¬ ease, is nearly as universal a symptom as the watch¬ fulness ; but though present during some part of almost every ca^e, is not uniformly present through¬ out its whole course. It is occasionally very violent, and reminds one of the shaking of the limbs in an attack of intermittent; but it sometimes amounts merely to a slight tremulousness. It extends to most of the voluntary muscles, affecting the tongue, the