Obstetrical Nursing: A Text-Book on the Nursing Care of the Expectant Mother, the Woman in Labor, the Young Mother and Her BabyVan Blarcom, Carolyn Conant
Science
Obstetrical Nursing: A Text-Book on the Nursing Care of the Expectant Mother, the Woman in Labor, the Young Mother and Her Baby
Van Blarcom, Carolyn Conant
Infants -- Care; Maternity nursing; Pregnancy
Well developed xerophthalmia is not common in this country but one sees
inflamed eyes and corneal ulcers in young children which clear up with
little local treatment after a mother has been persuaded to give the
patient more fresh milk, butter and green vegetables.
Mori reports upon about 1500 cases occurring in Japan, in 1905, among
children between the ages of two and five years. He states that the
disease does not occur among the fisher folk but among people whose diet
is largely composed of rice, barley, cereals, beans and “other
vegetables,” but he does not state what the other vegetables are. Prompt
relief of the eye symptoms was observed when cod-liver oil, chicken
livers and eel fat were administered.
Bloch describes cases of xerophthalmia among infants under one year of
age, in the vicinity of Copenhagen, during the years of 1912 and 1916.
(Fig. 140.) The babies were also suffering from malnutrition and the
skin was dry, shrivelled and scaly. Their diet consisted largely of
separator skimmed milk, which was, therefore, practically fat-free,
oatmeal gruel and barley soup. The milk was pasteurized and then cooked
in the home before being fed to the babies. Such a diet was so faulty
that the infants in question may well have been border-line cases of
scurvy and beri-beri, as well as developed cases of xerophthalmia. It is
also evident that the children were unquestionably suffering from
rickets.
It is believed that the condition known as night-blindness is related
to, or a mild or early form of xerophthalmia. It occurs in Newfoundland
and Labrador, among men in lumber camps and elsewhere, whose diet
consists chiefly of wheat flour, beans, meat, fish, molasses, raisins
and coffee. Such a diet is made up of those parts of the plant or animal
which have good keeping qualities, but these qualities do not compensate
for the poverty of the protective substance.
Dr. Anna Strong, who has had experience as a medical missionary in
India, observes that night-blindness is common in the vicinity of
Calcutta, and it is said to occur frequently in Russia during the Lenten
fasts. The popular treatment for this condition consists of poulticing
the eyes with fresh goat’s liver and giving the liver as a food as well;
while in Japan the efficacy of eating liver to cure night-blindness has
been recognized from early times.
=Pellagra= is a disease of obscure origin, associated with faulty
nutrition, which involves the nervous and digestive systems and the
skin. Usually one of the first symptoms is soreness and inflammation of
the mouth, then a remarkable, symmetrical eruption appears on parts of
the body, which, with weakness, nervousness and indigestion form the
most characteristic picture of the disease.
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