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
SYMPTOMS.——This disease generally begins with a dry cough, which often
continues for some months. If a disposition to vomit after eating be
excited by it, there is still greater reason to fear an approaching
consumption. The patient complains of a more than usual degree of heat,
a pain and oppression of the breast, especially after motion; his
spittle is of a saltish taste, and sometimes mixed with blood. He is apt
to be sad; his appetite is bad, and his thirst great. There is generally
a quick, soft, small pulse; though sometimes the pulse is pretty full,
and rather hard. These are the common symptoms of a beginning
consumption.
Afterwards the patient begins to spit a greenish, white, or bloody
matter. His body is extenuated by the hectic fever, and colliquative
sweats, which mutually succeed one another, _viz._ the one towards
night, and the other in the morning. A looseness, and an excessive
discharge of urine, are often troublesome symptoms at this time, and
greatly weaken the patient. There is a burning heat in the palms of the
hands, and the face generally flushes after eating; the fingers become
remarkably small, the nails are bent inwards, and the hairs fall off.
At last the swelling of the feet and legs, the total loss of strength,
the sinking of the eyes, the difficulty of swallowing, and the coldness
of the extremities, shew the immediate approach of death, which however
the patient seldom believes to be so near. Such is the usual progress of
this fatal disease, which, if not early checked, commonly sets all
medicine at defiance.
REGIMEN.——On the first appearance of a consumption, if the patient lives
in a large town, or any place where the air is confined, he ought
immediately to quit it, and to make choice of a situation in the
country, where the air is pure and free. Here he must not remain
inactive, but take every day as much exercise as he can bear.
The best method of taking exercise is to ride on horseback, as this
gives the body a great deal of motion without much fatigue. Such as
cannot bear this kind of exercise, must make use of a carriage. A long
journey, as it amuses the mind by a continual change of objects, is
greatly preferable to riding the same ground over and over. Care however
must be taken to avoid catching cold from wet clothes, damp beds, or the
like. The patient ought always to finish his ride in the morning, or at
least before dinner; otherwise it will oftener do harm than good.
It is pity those who attend the sick seldom recommend riding in this
disease, till the patient is either unable to bear it, or the malady has
become incurable. Patients are likewise apt to trifle with everything
that is in their own power. They cannot see how one of the common
actions of life should prove a remedy in an obstinate disease, and
therefore they reject it, while they greedily hunt after relief from
medicine, merely because they do not understand it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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