Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 3: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the AuthorRush, Benjamin
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Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 3: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the Author
Rush, Benjamin
Medicine; Yellow fever -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia
It assumed, in several instances, the symptoms of a colic and cholera
morbus. In one case the fever, after the colic was cured, ended in a
regular intermittent. In another, the colic was accompanied by a
hæmorrhage from the nose. I distinguished this bilious colic from that
which is excited by lighter causes, by its always coming on with more or
less of a chilliness[115]. The symptoms of colic and cholera morbus
occurred most frequently in June and July.
[115] See Sydenham, vol. I. p. 212.
4. It appeared in the form of a dysentery in a boy of William Corfield,
and in a man whom my pupil, Mr. Alexander, visited in the neighbourhood
of Harrowgate.
5. It appeared, in one case, in the form of an apoplexy.
6. It disguised itself in the form of madness.
7. During the month of November, and in all the winter months, it was
accompanied with pains in the sides and breast, constituting what
nosologists call the "pleuritis biliosa."
8. The puerperile fever was accompanied, during the summer and autumn,
with more violent symptoms than usual. Dr. Physick informed me, that two
women, to whom he was called soon after their delivery, died of uterine
hæmorrhages; and that he had with difficulty recovered two other lying-in
women, who were afflicted with that symptom of a malignant diathesis in
the blood-vessels.
9. Even dropsies partook more or less of the inflammatory and bilious
character of this fever.
10. It blended itself with the scarlatina. The blood, in this disease,
and in the puerperile fever, had exactly the same appearance that it had
in the yellow fever. A yellowness in the eyes accompanied the latter
disease in one case that came under my notice.
A slight shivering ushered in the fever in several instances. But the
worst cases I saw came on without a chilly fit, or the least sense of
coldness in any part of the body.
Such was the predominance of the intermitting, remitting, and bilious
fever, that the measles, the small-pox, and even the gout itself, partook
more or less of its character. There were several instances in which the
measles, and one in which the gout appeared with quotidian exacerbations;
and two in which madness appeared regularly in the form of a tertian.
I mentioned formerly that this fever sometimes went off with a sweat,
when it appeared in a tertian form. This was always the case with the
second grade of the fever, but never with the first degree of it, before
the third or fourth paroxysm; nor did a sweat occur on the fifth or
seventh day, except after the use of depleting remedies. This peculiarity
in the fever of this year was so fixed, that it gave occasion for my
comparing it, in my intercourse with my patients, to a lion on the first
seven days, and to a lamb during the remaining part of its duration.
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