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
4. The hydrophobia accords exactly with malignant fevers in its
duration. It generally terminates in death, according to its violence,
and the habit of the patient, in the first, second, third, fourth, or
fifth day, from the time of its attack, and with the same symptoms which
attend the last stage of malignant fevers.
5. The body, after death from the hydrophobia, putrifies with the same
rapidity that it does after death from a malignant fever in which no
depletion has been used.
6. Dissections of bodies which have died of the hydrophobia, exhibit the
same appearances which are observed in the bodies of persons who have
perished of malignant fevers. These appearances, according to Morgagni
and Tauvry[79], are marks of inflammation in the throat, [oe]sophagus,
trachea, brain, stomach, liver, and bowels. Effusions of water, and
congestions of blood in the brain, large quantities of dark-coloured
or black bile in the gall-bladder and stomach, mortifications in the
bowels and bladder, livid spots on the surface of the body, and, above
all, the arteries filled with fluid blood, and the veins nearly empty.
I am aware, that two cases of death from hydrophobia are related by Dr.
Vaughan, in which no appearance of disease was discovered by dissection
in any part of the body. Similar appearances have occasionally been met
with in persons who have died of malignant fevers. In another place I
hope to prove, that we err in placing disease in inflammation, for it
is one of its primary effects only, and hence, as was before remarked,
it does not take place in many instances in malignant fevers, until the
arteries are so far relaxed by two or three bleedings, as to be able to
relieve themselves by effusing red blood into serous vessels, and thus
to produce that error loci which I shall say hereafter is essential to
inflammation[80]. The existence of this grade of action in the arteries
may always be known by the presence of sizy blood, and by the more
obvious and common symptoms of fever.
[79] Bibliotheque Choisie de Medecine, tome XV. p. 210.
[80] In the 6th volume of the Medical Observations and Inquiries, there
is an account of a dissection of a person who had been destroyed
by taking opium. "No morbid appearance (says Mr. Whateley, the
surgeon who opened the body) was found in any part of the body,
except that the villous coat of the stomach was very slightly
inflamed." The stimulus of the opium in this case either produced
an action which transcended inflammation, or destroyed action
altogether by its immense force, by which means the more common
morbid appearances which follow disease in a dead body could not
take place.
The remedies for hydrophobia, according to the principles I have
endeavoured to establish, divide themselves naturally into two kinds.
I. Such as are proper to prevent the disease, after the infection of the
rabid animal is received into the body.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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