Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1875-04-16

tut toHCluulHH pOIllOu OF the article:
The practical considerations in regard to
the treatment Of disease which naturally
flow from the recent Investigations of fe-
yer, are very important and very obvious.
This is especially true since it has been
shown in Germany, that under the influ-
ence of continuous high bodily temporal
ture, not intense enough at any time to
compromise life, all the muscular tissues
of the body undergo a peculiar granular
degeneration. Many typhoid fever pa
tient has undoubtedly died from the heart
muscle having undergone this change,
when, if by artificial cooling the Temporal
ture Of the body had been kept down, the
alterations of the heart-structurc would
have been prevented, and death averted.
1t is obvious, also that the old plan of
thwartiDg the intentions of Nature, and de-
priving the fever patient of the free use Of
cooling drink, was practically banefu
cruelty. As the body is burning up in fe-
YER, it is also evident that to deprive it Of
sustenance is to aid in the production of
fatal exhaustion. The burning will 20 on,
whether food is given or not, so long as the
tissues can serve as fuel, OF course no
more food should be taken than the patient
can digest, but every grain of digested
food is so much added to the resources of
the system, which is engaged, it may be,
in close and doubtful conflict with dis
ease.
If it were possible. of course the best
treatment for fever would be that which
lessened the production of heat Fortu.
nately, we have some drugs-notably quin-
inc and alcohol-which do exert decided
influence upon the vital chemical move
ments, but, unfortunately, their power is
limited. AS we are therefore often unable
to control heat-production, the best we can
do is to abstract the caloric from the body
whenever it becomes so excessive as to
threaten serious results. To do this all that
is necessary is to put the patient IN cold
bath, or wrap him in sheet wet with ice
cold water, or lay him upon an ice mat
tress, or surround him with tubing through
which cold water runs, or use some SINH
lar etficacious device. l do not wish to be
misunderstood. External cold is not 10 be
lightly employed; it is a powerful two
edged weapon, capable of cutting both
ways-a weapon as injurious and destruc-
tive in the hands of the ignorant and mex
perienced as it is effectual in the hands of
those to whom study and experience have
taught its sklful use.
To illustrate what cold water may effect
when employed by intelligent and skilful
physicians, may be permitted to cite a
few hospital statistics from Germany and
Switzerland, the only countries where the
so-called antipyretic treatment of continued
fever, has been efficiently carried out on a
large scale. From 1850 to 1861, there were
treated without cold water, at the hospital
of Kiel, $50 cases of typhoid fever, with 81
deaths-a mortality of about l5I per cent;
from 1868 to 1866, l6O cases were treated
with cold baths, with deaths-a mortality
of only LILO per cent. In the hospital of
Bale, from 1913 to 1864, there were us cas-
es without antipyretic treatment, with 1859
deaths-a mortality of about ga per cent;
from September, 1866, TO 1873, 1l2l cases
were treated ALPHABETICALLY, with 81 deaths
"a mortality of little over per cent.
Assuredly, we may claim that this water
treatment in typhoid fever is one of the
greatest gains of modern medicine since
the discovery of an@sthcsia.
Some of our readers may here say TO
themselves, "Why, this is hydropathy |"
Not SO. 1t is the legitimate, not the illegit-
innate use Of cold water. 1t is the use of it
as single weapon, not as the only weapon
of the armory. 1t is the employment of
in single affection, not as a cure for all
diseases.
Perhaps, in concluding this essay, may
be pardoned one word of counsel to my lay
audience. Amy physician who proclaims
himself a follower of any special doctrine,
be he hydropath, an electropath, an alo-
path, homeopath, or any other path,
should be viewed with suspicion. Water,
cold, heat, electricity, drugs, are all agents
capable of being advantageously used in
the treatment of disease. Above all men,
the physician ought to have that teachable
spirit, which is the offspring of true humil-
ty. Knowing the great responsibilities
which he assumes, living almost beneath
the shadow of that past whose life-imper
illing mistakes are so plainly visible in the
light OF the present, he, of all men, should
be overseeing for new knowledge, gath
ering with equal zest the seeds of healing
in the waste as well as in the cultivated
places, among the lowest and most ignor-
ant of the populace as well as in far-famed
schools of medicine.