The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English: or, Medicine Simplified, 54th ed., One Million, Six Hundred; and Fifty Thousand — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English: or, Medicine Simplified, 54th ed., One Million, Six Hundred; and Fifty Thousand
John Stuart Mill · en
A dull pain in the head indicates fullness of the blood-vessels from
weakness, low blood, or general debility. It may be caused by taking
cold, thus producing passive congestion of the brain. It may proceed
from gastric disturbance, constipation of the bowels, or derangement of
the liver. Heaviness of the head sometimes precedes inflammation of the
brain, or chronic disease of its membranes. A dull, oppressive pain in
the head indicates softening of the brain, and is generally accompanied
by slowness of the pulse and of the speech. A pulsating pain of the head
occurs in heart disease, hysteria, and frequently accompanies some forms
of insanity.
THE EYE indicates morbid changes and furnishes unmistakable signs of
disease. Sinking of the eye indicates waste, as in consumption,
diarrhea, and cholera. In fevers it is regarded as a fatal symptom. A
dark or leaden circle around the eye, seen after hard work, indicates
fatigue and overdoing. If the mucous covering of the inner surface of
the lids and the ball of the eye is congested and inflamed, it exhibits
redness, and may indicate congestion or even inflammation of the brain.
A dilated pupil is often observed in catarrhal consumption, congestion
of the brain, low fevers, and chlorosis.
The pupil contracts in inflammation of the meninges, when there is
increased sensibility and intolerance of light, also in spinal
complaints. In some diseases the lustre of the eye increases, as in
consumption. But if it decreases with the attack of violent disease, it
indicates great debility and prostration.
EXAMINATION OF THE URINE. All medical authors and physicians of
education, freely admit and even insist upon the importance of
critically examining the patient's urine, in all cases in which there is
reason to suspect disease of the kidneys or bladder. In chronic
affections it is particularly serviceable, especially in derangements of
the liver, blood, kidneys, bladder, prostate gland, and nervous system.
Many scholarly physicians have sadly neglected the proper inspection of
the urine, because they were afraid of being classed with the illiterate
"uroscopian" doctors, or fanatical enthusiasts, who ignorantly pretend
to diagnose correctly _all_ diseases in this manner, thus subjecting
themselves and their claims to ridicule. Nothing should deter one from
giving to this excretion the attention it deserves.