Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 3: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the AuthorRush, Benjamin
Science
Medical Inquiries and Observations, Vol. 3: The Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged by the Author
Rush, Benjamin
Medicine; Yellow fever -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia
The _third_ class includes all those persons in whom the miasmata acted
so feebly as not to confine them to their beds or houses. This class of
persons affected by the yellow fever was very numerous. Many of them
recovered without medical aid, or by the use of domestic prescriptions;
many of them recovered in consequence of a spontaneous diarrh[oe]a, or
plentiful sweats; many were saved by moderate bleeding and purging; while
some died, who conceived their complaints to be occasioned by a common
cold, and neglected to take proper care of themselves, or to use the
necessary means for their recovery. It is not peculiar to the yellow
fever to produce this feeble operation upon the system, It has been
observed in the southern states of America, that in those seasons in
which the common bilious fever is epidemic "no body is quite well," and
that what are called in those states "inward fevers" are universal. The
small-pox, even in the natural way, does not always confine the patient;
and thousands pass through the plague without being confined to their
beds or houses. Dr. Hodges prescribed for this class of patients in his
parlour in London, in the year 1665, and Dr. Patrick Russel did the same
from a chamber window fifteen feet above the level of the street at
Aleppo. Notwithstanding the mild form the plague put on in these cases,
it often proved fatal according to Dr. Russel. I have introduced these
facts chiefly with a view of preparing the reader to reject the opinion
that we had two species of fever in the city at the same time; and to
show that the yellow fever appears in a more simple form than with
"strongly marked" characters; or, in other words, with a yellow skin and
a black vomiting.
It was remarkable that this fever always found out the weak part of every
constitution it attacked. The head, the lungs, the stomach, the bowels,
and the limbs, suffered more or less, according as they were more or less
debilitated by previous inflammatory or nervous diseases, or by a
mixture of both, as in the gout.
I have before remarked, that the influenza, the scarlatina, and a mild
bilious remittent, prevailed in the city, before the yellow fever made
its appearance. In the course of a few weeks they all disappeared, or
appeared with symptoms of the yellow fever; so that, after the first week
of September, it was the solitary epidemic of the city.
The only case like influenza which I saw after the 5th of September, was
in a girl of 14 years of age, on the 13th of the month. It came on with a
sneezing and cough. I was called to her on the third day of her disease.
The instant I felt her pulse, I pronounced her disease to be the yellow
fever. Her father was offended with this opinion, although he lived in a
highly infected neighbourhood, and objected to the remedies I prescribed
for her. In a few days she died. In the course of ten days, her father
and sister were infected, and both died, I was informed, with the usual
symptoms of the yellow fever.
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