*Care after Vaccination.*--As vaccination is a surgical procedure, it
should be conducted aseptically with a sterile instrument on clean
skin, and the wound should be guarded against extraneous infection.
It is well therefore to put either a sterile gauze cover or a clean
shield over the wound as soon as the virus has been sufficiently
absorbed, and to leave the protection on until the natural crust has
been formed,--_i.e._, for a few hours. If the guard could be kept
in position without motion and also without injurious pressure, it
might remain until the process ended with the formation of a scar and
the exfoliation of the crust; but practically it is so certain that
the guard will be moved that it is wise to remove it and to trust
to the protection of a clean muslin or linen cloth attached to the
loose sleeve or other undergarment. For a day or two at the time when
the inflammation is at its height it may be well again to guard by
a shield against injury from a blow or push, but the shield should
always be regarded as itself a danger. If by any accident the vaccine
pustule becomes infected, it should be treated like any other infected
wound,--the crust removed, the ulcer cleansed with antiseptics and
dressed surgically. The immunity given by the pock is not at all
lessened by this treatment.
*Normal Clinical Course.*--After primary vaccination in man there is a
stage of incubation lasting for from forty-eight to seventy-two hours;
a papule then develops, and by the end of the third or fourth day
this has begun to show umbilication and a vesicular structure. When
fully developed, about the sixth day after vaccination, the vesicle is
distended and pearly in color. On the seventh or eighth day the areola
develops,--_i.e._, the skin about the vesicle becomes hard, sensitive,
and red, the redness extending a variable distance, not usually more
than two inches from the edge of the vesicle. In the course of the next
day or two the vesicle loses its pearly appearance and becomes opaque
and often slightly yellow. With the development of the areola and of
the pustule the adjacent lymph glands may swell and become somewhat
painful; there may also be constitutional derangement,--some fever,
pain, anorexia, restlessness, and more or less prostration; there is
usually a moderate leucocytosis. About the eleventh or twelfth day the
areola begins to fade, the constitutional symptoms to subside, and
the pustule to dry up. A dark crust is formed which drops off usually
between the eighteenth and twenty-fifth days, leaving a rosy depressed
scar on which not infrequently a secondary scab is formed, to be shed a
few days later.
*Variations in the Clinical Course.*--The vesicles may appear on the
second day, but it is more frequently delayed until the fourth, fifth,
sixth, seventh, or even the eighth day, and cases have been observed in
which the delay was even longer.
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