The Portland daily press., 1893-01-16
IN. Y. SIM.

The enormous strides made by the
new force in commerce and industries of
late years have been to certain extent
paralleled by the application of cleo
tricity in medicine and surgery. The
electric motor turns the drill of the den
fist, bores out all the noses of mankind
in the hands of the rhinologist, and may
run the saw and the trephine of the sur
geon. The electric light is made to illu-
inmate all the cavities and interiors OF
the human body, SO that 1.-THE pestilence
that walketh in darkness" in the black
recesses of our viscera is sought out and
driven way by the electric search light.
1t is nothing now to put an endoscope
into the stomach and scrutinize its walls
form one end to the other, and in dark
room the very size of the stomach is de-
termined by the translumination of the
abdominal walls when light is turned
on inside that viscus.
Electricity furnishes heat for the eau
terry, with which morbid surfaces may
be healed, wounds stimulated and tu-
mors extirpated.
The electrolytic needle removes the
hairs of the bearded women, eradicates
birthmarks, decomposes tumors, coagu-
lates aneurisms, and in its most romantic
role manufactures those most desired Or
naments of the feminine physiognomy,
| lovely dimples.
The electromagnetic pulls out the beam
from our neighbours eye when the beam
| is in the shape of piece of iron and
directed by the ophthalmologist. 1t may
hunt up and draw out wandering
needles.
| One of the new features OF electric
medication is the introduction of drugs
| into the human body through the skin.
This is done by placing solutions of any
drug upon sponge, which is made the
pos tive pole and placed against the skin.
When the current is turned on the drug
is actually driven through the, skin into
tissues. The application is not at all
painful. Thus cocaine has been driven
in over painful nerve, and neuralgias
have been relieved by it. Many other
drugs have been used in this way This
property of electricity is known as cata-
phoresis. Operations have been per-
|
| subiacent tissues alphabetically,
The neurologist, perhaps, finds large
| therapeutic field for electrical explorac
ton With the continuous current he
soothes the pains of peripheral nerves,
calms down an excited brain, stimulates
healthy proce sses in diseased spinal
cord, exercises paralyzed muscles, re-
iuvenates overworked limbs and aids in
the rebuilding of tissues in members
that have wasted away. Sometimes he
calls into his aid the interrupted and the
alternating currents, and occasionally
takes into service the static sparks
evolved from his big glass wheels and
Leyden jars
The method of the working of cleo
tricity in disorders of the nervous sys-
TEN is much more obscure than in the
| maladies mentioned above, where heat,
light, eleotrolysis and cataphoresis pro-
duce effects at once apparent to the
senses. Not able to demonstrate objec-
lively the value of electricity in some OF
the chronic nervous diseases, a great
deal has to be accepted on faith. There
is dispute in some quarters as to its III
trinsic value here, and many incline to
the idea that suggestion has good deal
to do with improvement in patients OF
this kind treated in this way.
Besides it's employment as a therapeu-
tic agent, electricity has considerable val
ne s a means of diagnosis in many
neurological conditions. For instance,
the resistance as measured by the rheo-
stat is reduced in exophthalmic goitre and
increased in hysteria. The muscular
contractions produced in paralysis from
injury to certain parts of the nervous
| system are SO different from contrac-
| al ctrioi fv i'm arqI
ysis due to LESSONS in the brain, as an
example, that their differentiation consti-
tutes an important aid in Distinguishing
these affections one from another. Then,
t o, in the surgery of the brain and of
nerve-roots it is very valuable in localiz-
ing the exact region to be operated upon.
Indeed, much of our Knowledge of loo J.
alton of functions in different parts OF
the surface of the brain is owing to cleo
tricity made use of by psychologists in
their marvellous experimental researches
in cerebral domains.
Altogether electricity occupies an ex-
tensive place in the armamentarium of
the physician. All parts of the human
economy are explored by its beneficent
light, and there is no cell so secretly hid
den that it may not be influenced by
this wonderful force which may be made
to penetrate skin, muscle, bone. blood,
nerves and viscera. No one can yet place
limit upon it's possibilities as a remedi-
al agent, for each year new apparatus,
new devices, new forms of current and
new methods are made available to the
medical profession in its noble warfare
against the diseases which assail man
kind on every hand. 1t is not in vain
that men have sometimes looked heaven
ward for aid in sore affection, for has
not the lightning been drawn from the
clouds to become his friend and heaven
born ally?
! PERSONAL AND PECULIAR.