Opening the text

Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 2: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the AuthorRush, Benjamin

Science

Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 2: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the Author

Name: Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 2: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the Author
Author: Rush, Benjamin

Rush, Benjamin

Medicine; Yellow fever -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia

A puncture in the brain has been proposed by some writers to discharge
the water from its ventricles. If the theory I have delivered be true,
the operation promises nothing, even though it could always be performed
with perfect safety. In cases of local injuries, or of inflammation from
any cause, it must necessarily increase the disease; and in cases of
effusion only, the debilitated state of the whole system forbids us to
hope for any relief from such a local remedy.

Bark, wine, and opium promise much more success in the last stage of
the disease. I can say nothing in their favour from my own experience;
but from the aid they afford to mercury in other diseases, I conceive
they might be made to accompany it with advantage.

Considering the nature of the indirect causes which induce the disease,
and the case of a relapse, which has been mentioned, after an interval
of near three years, as well as the symptoms of slow convalescence,
manifested by the pulse, which occurred in the first and seventh cases,
I submit it to the consideration of physicians, whether the use of
moderate exercise, and the cold bath, should not be recommended to
prevent a return of the disease in every case, where it has yielded to
the power of medicine.

I have great pleasure in adding, that the theory of this disease,
which I have delivered, has been adopted by many respectable physicians
in Philadelphia, and in other parts of the United States, and that it
has led to the practice that has been recommended, particularly to
copious blood-letting; in consequence of which, death from a dropsy of
the brain is not a more frequent occurrence, than from any other of the
acute febrile diseases of our country.




                              OBSERVATIONS

                                  UPON

                          THE NATURE AND CURE

                                 OF THE

                                _GOUT_.


In treating upon the gout, I shall deliver a few preliminary
propositions.

1. The gout is a disease of the whole system. It affects the ligaments,
blood-vessels, stomach, bowels, brain, liver, lymphatics, nerves,
muscles, cartilages, bones, and skin.

2. The gout is a primary disease, only of the solids. Chalk-stones,
abscesses, dropsical effusions into cavities, and cellular membrane, and
eruptions on the skin, are all the effects of a morbid action in the
blood-vessels. The truth of this proposition has been ably proved by Dr.
Cullen in his First Lines.

Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.

Opening the text

Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 2: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the AuthorRush, Benjamin

Science

Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 2: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the Author

Rush, Benjamin

Medicine; Yellow fever -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia

A puncture in the brain has been proposed by some writers to discharge
the water from its ventricles. If the theory I have delivered be true,
the operation promises nothing, even though it could always be performed
with perfect safety. In cases of local injuries, or of inflammation from
any cause, it must necessarily increase the disease; and in cases of
effusion only, the debilitated state of the whole system forbids us to
hope for any relief from such a local remedy.

Bark, wine, and opium promise much more success in the last stage of
the disease. I can say nothing in their favour from my own experience;
but from the aid they afford to mercury in other diseases, I conceive
they might be made to accompany it with advantage.

Considering the nature of the indirect causes which induce the disease,
and the case of a relapse, which has been mentioned, after an interval
of near three years, as well as the symptoms of slow convalescence,
manifested by the pulse, which occurred in the first and seventh cases,
I submit it to the consideration of physicians, whether the use of
moderate exercise, and the cold bath, should not be recommended to
prevent a return of the disease in every case, where it has yielded to
the power of medicine.

I have great pleasure in adding, that the theory of this disease,
which I have delivered, has been adopted by many respectable physicians
in Philadelphia, and in other parts of the United States, and that it
has led to the practice that has been recommended, particularly to
copious blood-letting; in consequence of which, death from a dropsy of
the brain is not a more frequent occurrence, than from any other of the
acute febrile diseases of our country.




                              OBSERVATIONS

                                  UPON

                          THE NATURE AND CURE

                                 OF THE

                                _GOUT_.


In treating upon the gout, I shall deliver a few preliminary
propositions.

1. The gout is a disease of the whole system. It affects the ligaments,
blood-vessels, stomach, bowels, brain, liver, lymphatics, nerves,
muscles, cartilages, bones, and skin.

2. The gout is a primary disease, only of the solids. Chalk-stones,
abscesses, dropsical effusions into cavities, and cellular membrane, and
eruptions on the skin, are all the effects of a morbid action in the
blood-vessels. The truth of this proposition has been ably proved by Dr.
Cullen in his First Lines.

Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.

Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 2: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the Author

Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 2: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the Author

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