Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-03-16
DOCTORS AND WOMEN.
Shirley Dare Writes About Their
Relations to Each Other.
NOVELTIES IN MEDICAL PAPERS.
The Bite Of an Angry or Jealous Woman
Produces an Ugly Wound.
GETTING RID OF SUPERFLU0US HAIR
WRITTEN FOR THE DISPATCH J

tors are the only class who rightly measure
the influence of the sex, neither appraising
them too highly in world which has many
| interesting facts beside women; nor, on the
other hand, putting aside real ailments and
troubles as mere nervousness, which the Or
| dinary man is inclined to do. A good doc
| tor, that is, one gifted with natural insight,
who understands his calling, has fewer illu-
sions about women and more sympathy TOR
them than any other living being. The
sensible doctor is apt to stand as woman's
best friend.
A sensible doctor, and there one must
sigh, for sensible doctors don't hang their
sign on every bush, and I begin to think
they are as scarce as sensible women or
| pleasant days in Philadelphia winter.
When druggist tells Of putting Up pepsin
| in doses OF 40 grains each for sick woman,
or of prescriptions from leading physicians
who order IA or 16 powerful ingredients in
one mixture, as one of the trustiest city dis
pensers told me last week, one begins to
think it is we'll for people to know some
thing about their own bodies, and what
| goes inside of them. The low English
phrase "their insides" expresses all most
people know of their interiors As witty
woman says, they seem to consider their
insides as sort of bag or cavity of which
they know as little as they do of the here
after. They commit care of their souls to
| the preachers and their bodies to the doctors
with as little concern as if it was nothing to
| them what becomes of either.
FORTY PER CENT PREvENTABLE.
The best physicians agree that at least 40
per cent of all deaths by disease are prevent
able; that is out OF each 100 people dying in
civilized countries to-day, at least 40 might
| be saved by skilled medicine and good
nursing. A city physician of high standing
tells of cases under his knowledge of the
grossest malpractice by men, equally high
| in the profession; one where q case of In
ward ulcer was diagnosed and treated as
spinal disease, till it was too late to heal the
real malady, and he with others was called
on to sign the certificate absolving the doctor
from blame.
81 knew it was the grossest error" said
the enlightened physician; ''but what could
1 do? The patient was dead, and couidn' t
be brought to lite. II 1 refused to sign, it
would make trouble for me in my business,
and the doctors friends would all be against
me. But it was case of manslaughter for
all that"
1t is something to have doctors awakened
to the crime of losing human life through
ignorance and incompetence. In time in
telligent conscience and sense of honor will
forbid an able man to sign such certificate,
even at risk of professional goodwill and
income.
More than one notorious trial for murder
by poisoning could be instanced, where the
prescriptions administered by the attending
physician were irritant and drastic enough
to account for all the symptoms alleged.
But nobody ever thought of questioning the
doctors medicine, unless it was few trou-
blesome scientific persons whose modest sug-
gestions were quenched III the hue and cry
after murder and poisoning.
1t suggests itself to the intelligent mind
that perhaps it might be safe for the public
to know as much more of its own physiology
as it can spare time from lawn tennis, base
ball and spring sewing to find out. Anyone
who has really been sick once in lifetime
and had some trouble in getting cured finds
very fervid interest in reading about
health and disease. not the simple elemen-
tary articles which doctors furnish the news
papers, but such as they write for each
other, of which the intelligent layman can
pick out the sense between the hard words.
THE MEDICAL JOURNALS.
Take, for instance, the Annual Of the
Medical Sciences one of the most thorough
performances of the age, in which corps OF
the keenest physicians collect all the OBJ
servations and discoveries in medicine
yearly all over the globe. You didn't
know there were medical journals printed
in Arabic to-day, or that the best Arab
doctors hold the respect of the profession as
when their forefathers first brought intelli-
gent medicine to Europe. 1t enlarges our
ideas of progress to hear of medical maga-
zines published in Siberia and the Cape of
Good Hope, to say nothing of Japan, which
has seven periodicals of the kind. It was no
slight project to enlist the leading men of
the profession in this work, which numbers
among its contributors the physicians to the
Empress of Russia and the Queen of Italy,
besides half dozen other court doctors, and
such princes of the science as Sir Morel
Mackenzie, DR.. B. Ward Richardson, of
London, and nearly every name of weight
in this country and Britain, Prof. Seguin,
of New York, and Drs. Minot, OF Boston;
Witherstine and Van Harlingen, of Phila-
delphia, and the noted physicians of Vienna,
Jena, Prague, Copenhagen and Moscow, in
all about 300 distinguished editors, enthusi-
astic as they are exact and profound.
No wonder that last year In this country
500 lives were saved by suggestions from this
source, tribute more exquisite than any
praise which could be offered. The seven vol
umes Tor last year COMPRESS the value of the
years issue of over 800 medical journals
Borrow it of your doctor. who ought to have
it, if he does not, and you will find it highly
interesting reading. My purpose is solely to
record some curious observations on women.
HUMAN BEINGS WHO BITE.
DR.. Soriano, of Mexico, reports 16 cases of
bites by human beings, mostly women, in one
year, pastime in which they indulge with
comparative frequency. The bite of an angry
or Jealous woman makes an ugly wound ut
first attended with little blood, but red, hot
and very painful, often developing erysip-
elias, calling for deep incisions and amputa-
tions of finger or limb. Recovery is al
ways slow, tedious and painful; evel death
may result. The time required Tor cure is
from 13 days to five months. II seen early
one may distinguish whether the wound was
made bv a simple bite, or whether chewing
or tearing took place, the size OF the wound
varying with the dimensions of the jaws and
the tenderness of the skin and tissues at
tackled, from one-quarter to an inch. I men,
tion this as afording new class of morbid |
horrors for the intense school OF novelists.
DR.. Mackenzie, of London, suggests a |
treatment for skin diseases which is valua- |
Bile lor improving the complexion. Hot |
baths, alkaline with borax or pearline, or |
glutinous with bran or rice water are of |
vaIue in soothing the skin, removing scales |
and waste and promoting persplration. A |
diaphoretic mixture combined with quinine |
is given to secure healthy action of the |
kidneys, which have much to do with clear |
ing the skin, and preventing unsghtly |
fuzziness of the race. A lint mask STEPPED |
- 1ot,o of -, 10 IF nd 81,