and during the last hour he has absorbed such an amount of caloric,
that the change seems a very pleasant one, and his skin has been so
toned that he runs not the slightest risk (even were he the frailest
person with pulmonary disease) of catching cold. Singular as it may
seem, the first case of such a result has yet to be recorded.
This is all the more remarkable when we consider that instead of being
immediately wrapped up after his vigorous drying with furzy
bath-towels, he is kept naked for five minutes longer during a further
process of hand-rubbing and shampooing by an attendant. The shampooing
takes place as he lies prostrate on a couch and thus gives his
debility all the advantage of rest and passive exercise at the same
time. Whether we explain it upon the yet unsettled hypotheses of
friction, the suppling which the patient gets in this part of the
process from the hands of a strong, faithful, cheerful-minded and
hale-bodied servant is one of the most valuable means which can be
relied upon for the relief of opium suffering at any stage
whatever. After coming from the anteroom our patient who entered more
dead than alive may feel vigor that he would like to give his
recovered powers play in walking back to his room, but it is best not
to humor him by letting him draw on his first deposit. He should be
tenderly wheeled back as he came--put to bed, and if it does not
revolt his appetite, fed slowly as before another cup of
beef-tea. After that he will probably fall into a refreshing slumber
from which he is on no account to be roused, but suffered to wake
himself. On his waking another cup of beef-tea should be given him,
and no other medicine, unless his pulse becomes alarming and he shows
signs of return to the original sinking condition in which we found
him--when the nux may be repeated.
It is now improbable, after the happy change described has taken place
in him, that he will succumb to the acute attack of opium-poisoning
which led him to us. Alarming as it appears, it is seldom dangerous or
persistent. The patient who has not constitutional strength to rally
at once, goes down rapidly and dies in a few days, while he who
rallies once gets well, _pro hâc vice_, without much medical
treatment save that which was promptly given at the critical moment,
or treatment of any kind but nourishing food, rest, baths, and
vigilant, tender nursing. As soon as the chronic appetite calls for
its habitual dose, and the stomach receives it without revenging its
grudge against the recent excesses, the patient may be considered out
of danger as far as the acute attack is concerned.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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