Essays In Pastoral MedicineWalsh, James J. (James Joseph)
Religion
Essays In Pastoral Medicine
Walsh, James J. (James Joseph)
First aid in illness and injury; Medicine
Food is to be taken to the door of the sick-room by some one other
than the attendant. The tray should not be carried into the room.
After the meal, take to the door a pan containing water, and let the
attendant set the dishes, knives and forks, and the food handled by
the child, under the water without touching the rim or sides of the
dish-pan. Then any one may carry the pan to the kitchen, where it is
to be set upon the stove, and the water holding the dishes and the
rejected food is boiled for an hour. After that process the contents
of the pan are safe, and they may be handled for washing. Cloths used
in wiping the mouth of the patient are to be wrapped in paper and
burned. Dejecta should be covered with fresh chlorinated lime, one
part to two of water.
After the patient begins to convalesce the danger of infection grows
greater. When the membrane has disappeared, and the child is able to
run about the room, the attendant ceases commonly to use the
throat-spray because the process is troublesome. In such cases the
diphtheria bacillus remains in the patient's mouth for some time--from
a few days to weeks. During the most of this time the child is as
dangerous to others as it was while it was ill. In one case in my own
experience, the bacillus remained present for eleven weeks from the
date of diagnosis, and I then lost sight of the child. In the tenth
week the bacillus present when in pure culture killed a guinea-pig in
thirty-six hours. This is, of course, an exceptional occurrence; but
the routine practice is to keep the patient isolated for three weeks
after the membrane has disappeared, unless a bacteriological
examination shows that the bacillus is absent. The bacillus remains
after the use of antitoxin just as if antitoxin had not been used.
When a child is to be released from the sick-room, bathe it carefully
with soaped warm water, washing out the hair and under the
finger-nails carefully. Then wet a towel with the disinfectant (the
acid bichloride of mercury,--a {193} teaspoonful to a gallon of water)
and go over the body with it; afterward rinse with ordinary water. Do
not let the disinfectant enter the child's mouth or eyes. Next,
without allowing the child to touch anything in the room, especially
avoiding the door-knob, send it to another room and dress it in
clothing that has not been near the sick-room. If, after this process,
other children are infected, the explanation is that the child had
been released too soon--before the bacillus had disappeared.
It commonly happens that a child has been going about the house for
some days before a physician has been called in. In that event you
have the house to disinfect. You must then wet with bichloride
everything the child has touched, and boil all eating utensils.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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