Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1904-01-28
BAD THERMOMETERS
BARN Done in Hands of Persons
Without Medical knowledge.
Common Instruments yaIueless in
Determining the Temperature
of Patients-Matter of VI
tai e

Probably no instrument claiming Z
register with precision is so Inaccurate
as the average thermometer. This be
ing so. il is somewhat amusing to no
tice the blind faith with which the ay.
erage citizen depends on these devices
for indicating temperature. As a sci
entifc instrument each is apparently
entitled 10 a respect approaching rev
erence. and its dicta are not to be
questioned, says the Medical News
The fact is that the variations among
a dozen ordinary thermometers will
often amount to five or six degrees
as any one can see who will glance at
a druggists window. With thermome-
tiers used for scientific work there is,
of course, less variation, but their in
accuracy is often considerable, and in
clinical instruments IL may easily be
so great as to affect a physicians dag
nosis.
A prominent hospital in this city has
scarcely recovered from the shock of
a recent discovery made by the mem
bers of its house staff-namely, that
the thermometers in regular use in its
wards vary so much as to render
valueless the temperature charts
which w~ell-trained nurses have been
taught to regard as one of their chief
responsibilities. 1t is a rude awaken
ing, indeed. for a physician suddenly
10 be made TO realize that he has been
treating for fever patients who have
no fever, and that patients have been
discharged as cured whose tempera-
lures were far from normal. Think OF
the wasted energy of sponge baths
and Of tubbings, Of antipyretics used
without due warrant, of fluid diets
forced upon h~alf-starved convalescents |
who longed for solid food. and would
have been all the better for il; of pa
tients kept in bed and in the hospital
when they might have benefited by
freedom Of out Of doors. These are no
Imaginary evils; they are errors actu-
ally committed, and errors which we
have no doubt are being repeated to-
day in many Of our best hospitals.
every possible care is supposed
to be lavished on patients. Is this the
hospital management of which Ameri-
are so proud?
In the hospital, whose experience has
been made known to us, actual tests of
groups Of thermometers used in the same
wards and on the same patients revealed
differences too striking and too seri-
to be lightly passed over. In some
'ases these differences were as great as
10 degrees Fahrenheit-variations wide
to prove embarrassing in dag
losis and misleading in treatment. This
state Of affairs has existed
.p%parently for a long time-the inevi-
able fruit Of a policy which seeks to di-
'orce economy and efficiency. Good
are costly; cheap ones
God the market, and the tide rises even |
INTO the sacred precincts OF hospital
Yards, where II browns all decent regard |
Or the patients welfare.
II is not In hospitals alone that the |
Ice of cheap Thermometers has taken /
In the stock of the average drug /
In this city will be found a small /
lumber of clinical thermometers, relia-
ly certificated, and a much larger num-
er bearing certificates of doubtful au-
1enticity or having no certificates at
u. The latter represent the practice of
rivate physicians and the public In TAX
ig OF temperature at home. Most OF
lese thermometers are cheap; many of
are old, and all Of them are unre-
able, because eve when they happen
be accurate we cannot feel sure of
Iem, and we are bound to question and
to discount the privilege of
sting selections from retail stocks. but =
e have found that variations of two de-
'ees' are not uncommon.
Here is a matter Of vital concern to the n
and the public. The volun- \
ry testing and c%ertifcation of Their
by recognized experts is a
feguard within the reach of those who
e willing to pay for it. Inasmuch as y
is protection is so commonly neglected :
the question may well be raised
neither compulsory eertifcation is not =
pfwuAT- m