A treatise on clinical medicine, being a compendious and systematic introduction to practice, as contained in the memoranda of I. R. Bischoff / From the German, by Joseph Cope.

  • Bischoff, Ignaz Rudolph, Edler von Altenstern, 1784-1850
Date:
1827
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A treatise on clinical medicine, being a compendious and systematic introduction to practice, as contained in the memoranda of I. R. Bischoff / From the German, by Joseph Cope. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    diagnosis we are led, with the aid of singly col- lected facts, to a general idea of the disease; and here the practical teacher follows a method the reverse of the pathologist, who first establishes the idea of the disease, and afterwards assigns its symptoms, causes, divisions, &c. By means of the diagnosis, the physician sees at once the previous, present, and future course (progno- sis) of the disease. This last he endeavours to establish according to the probability, whether the disease will terminate in health, in another disease, or in death. The prognosis, when given in the vernacular tongue, requires very great caution, lest the patient’s courage should be cast down by the detail of unfavourable symptoms; whence in many cases it must be omitted in the patient’s presence, and reserved for another place. After the diagnosis is established, the third principal proposition follows, viz., the plan of treatment. 1 his is grounded on the accuracy of the diagnosis, and on the indication thereon con- structed, that is, on the determination of the changes which must take place in the patient’s frame, from nature or art, to bring about the cura- tive process; and as these changes are either ef- fected by nature or by art, so there is a natural and an artificial cure. Our first object is to procure the removal, as far as possible, of the efficient causes; but this may be no longer in our power: diseases then require.