The record-union., 1892-11-19
A HOMEOPATHIST ON CHOLERA
TREATMENT.

AS it is agreed among physicians that
in all likelihood the cholera will renew
It's assault in the early spring Of next
year, and as it has not disappeared from
Europe and is not likely to, during the
coming winter it is of interest to consider
the subject in this period of calm, when
mems minds can coolly examine the
methods of prevention, treatment and
cure, and come to fair understanding of
what the several schools of medicine
hold regarding the disease. Here now is
a leading homeopathist who advances
some ideas quite at right angles with
those presented by other physicians upon
the same subject.
DR.. Henry Sheffield, in the Arena, con-
tends that it is proven that choleraic
germs float or flow in currents through
the air, just as the gulf stream does
through the ocean. Thus ships leaving
a clean port sail into this germ current
and cholera at once breaks out on board,
even in mid-ocean.
The germ propagates as it moves, and
hence the current enlarges as it advances.
To prove this he traces several currents
in epidemic seasons, and certainly makes
for his position very strong defenses.
When the germ current enters an atmos-
phere its germs destroy the life-sustain-
ing power of the air il that air is suited
to the propagation Of the germ. Hence it
is that one town within the current will
suffer, while another but short distance
from it will be free from the pest.
So it is that those within the choleraic
current become enfeebled and exhausted.
Now, he holds, as the digestive organs
become weak, powerless to perform their
functions well, the lacteals become inert
and cease to take up the chyle and trans
fer it into the viscera, thence into the
blood vessels. This DEMONSTRATING pro-
duct then remains in the intestine, flows
onward, combining with its other con-
tents, and then becomes corrupt matter.
Now, says DR.. Sheffield, to use power
ing this putrid mass within this perfectly
natural sewer of the body, is dangerous
and destructive. To build dam across
a stream will not make itpure. The liver
secretiOns are essential to the formation
of chyme from wholesome food. In a
cholera attack the stomach refuses food,
at which time there are no secretions re-
quired of the liver to aid digestion. To
spur the healthy liver to greater activity
small doses of calomel are sufficient but
in a weak state in cholera large doses are
necessary, and this he deems dangerous
in the extreme, because the secretions Of
the liver are taken from the blood, and it
will soon become exhausted if not re-
supplied by the blood-making organs.
and in cholera they cannot furnish it.
even in small quantities.
The great sympathetic nerve controlling
the action of the abdominal viscera is ir-
ritated by acrid substances which traverse
the intestines, and by reflex action pro-
duce cramps and vomiting. Opium and its
congeners produce insensibility of the
brain, paralysis OF the cerebro-spinal and
great sympathetic nerves and suspends
every function of the body. He therefore
insists that it should never be taken
during an attack of cholera. This so flies
in the face of a score of cholera remedies,
some of them approved and prescribed
by physicians, that DR.. Shenield's paper
is certain to provoke discussion and criti-
cism.
He holds that curative remedies be.
come inert if the patient has been dosed
with opium, and that alcoholic drinks.
astringent and pungent concoctions, will
diminish or destroy the normal secre-
tions of the alimentary canal and create
Inflammation, which is as fatal as is
cholera.
He condemns iced drinks, ice cream
and sherbert, ham, sausage, boiled cab
bage, milk, cheese, nuts, pickles, salads,
honey, molasses, pastry, canned fish,
oysters and lobsters during an epidemic.
To use stimulants to create appetite dur
ing a cholera epidemic will invite disas-
ter, for in such seasons, when the air of
the locality is affected as described in the