Domestic medicine : $b or, a treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases by regimen and simple medicines. With an appendix, containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitionersBuchan, William
Science
Domestic medicine : $b or, a treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases by regimen and simple medicines. With an appendix, containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitioners
Buchan, William
Medicine, Popular -- Early works to 1800
The patient should be kept as quiet and easy as possible. Company,
noise, and every thing that disturbs the mind, is hurtful. Even too much
light, or any thing that affects the senses, ought to be avoided. His
attendants should be as few as possible, and they ought not to be too
often changed. His inclinations ought rather to be soothed than
contradicted; even the promise of what he craves will often satisfy him
as much as its reality.
MEDICINE.——In this and all other fevers, attended with a hard, full,
quick pulse, bleeding is of the greatest importance. This operation
ought always to be performed as soon as the symptoms of an inflammatory
fever appear. The quantity of blood to be taken away, however, must be
in proportion to the strength of the patient and the violence of the
disease. If after the first bleeding the fever should increase, and the
pulse become more frequent and hard, there will be a necessity for
repeating it a second, and perhaps a third, or even a fourth time, which
may be done at the distance of twelve, eighteen, or twenty-four hours
from each other, as the symptoms require. If the pulse continues soft,
and the patient is tolerably easy after the first bleeding, it ought not
to be repeated.
If the heat and fever be very great, forty or fifty drops of the
dulcified or sweet spirit of nitre may be made into a draught, with an
ounce of rose-water, two ounces of common water, and half an ounce of
simple syrup, or a bit of loaf-sugar. This draught may be given to the
patient every three or four hours while the fever is violent; afterwards
once in five or six hours will be sufficient.
If the patient be afflicted with retching, or an inclination to vomit,
it will be right to assist Nature’s attempts, by giving him weak
camomile-tea, or lukewarm water to drink.
If the body is bound, a clyster of milk and water with a little salt,
and a spoonful of sweet oil or fresh butter in it, ought daily to be
administered. Should this not have the desired effect, a tea-spoonful of
magnesia alba, or cream of tartar, may be frequently put into his drink.
He may likewise eat tamarinds, boiled prunes, roasted apples, and the
like.
If about the tenth, eleventh, or twelfth day, the pulse becomes more
soft, the tongue moister, and the urine begins to let fall a reddish
settlement, there is reason to expect a favourable issue to the disease.
But if, instead of these symptoms, the patient’s spirits grow languid,
his pulse sinks, and his breathing becomes difficult; with a stupor,
trembling of the nerves, starting of the tendons, &c. there is reason to
fear that the consequences will be fatal. In this case blistering
plasters must be applied to the head, ancles, inside of the legs or
thighs, as there may be occasion; poultices of wheat-bread, mustard, and
vinegar, may likewise be applied to the soles of the feet, and the
patient must be supported with cordials, as strong wine-whey, negus,
sago-gruel with wine in it, and such like.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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