The American new dispensatory : Containing general principles of pharmaceutic chemistry; chemical analysis of the articles of materia medica; pharmaceutic operations; materia medica, including several new and valuable articles, the production of the United States; preparations and compositions. With an appendix, containing an account of mineral waters; medical prescriptions; the nature and medical uses of the gases; medical electricity; galvanism; an abridgment of Dr. Currie's reports on the use of water; the cultivation of the poppy plant, and the method of preparing opium ... The whole compiled from the most approved authors, both European and American.

  • Thacher, James, 1754-1844.
Date:
1817
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The American new dispensatory : Containing general principles of pharmaceutic chemistry; chemical analysis of the articles of materia medica; pharmaceutic operations; materia medica, including several new and valuable articles, the production of the United States; preparations and compositions. With an appendix, containing an account of mineral waters; medical prescriptions; the nature and medical uses of the gases; medical electricity; galvanism; an abridgment of Dr. Currie's reports on the use of water; the cultivation of the poppy plant, and the method of preparing opium ... The whole compiled from the most approved authors, both European and American. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    Some practitioners have preferred the practice of plunging the patient several times in a cold bath, and vio- lently dashing the body with cold water. But simply washing the patient with cloths dipped in cold vinegar and water, was found much preferable to immersion ;* both because it more effectually diminished the heat of the sys- tem, and was less fatiguing to the patient. Experiments have proved, that repeatedly wiping and washing with water, in the ordinary way in which the operation is per- formed, diminished the heat seven or eight degrees more than simple immersion, or dashing it over the body with pails. The practice of cold bathing in fevers of this type, is not a new one, but was very commonly employed at Breslaw in Silesia; and of late years has been very suc- cessfully applied in the West Indies,! as well as in diffe- rent parts of Europe, where diseases of this type prevail. Professor Gregory, of Edinburgh, and Dr. Currie, an eminent physician at Liverpool, have also prescribed it with great advantage in the low typhus fevers of those cities. But its great success in the New York hospital, as employed by Dr. Samuel Bard, and in the private practice of my brother, have fully convinced me of its use. It is also proper to remark, that where the physician was not called to the patient in the first stage of the dis- ease, and putrid symptoms had appeared, and the patient had become much debilitated, the cold bath was injurious : and from the abuse of cold bathing, by employing it in the last stage of the disease, it has fallen into disrepute with some practitioners. But as the abuse of a thing is no argument against its use, I repeat my observation, that in the Jirst or inflammatory stage of the disease, it was one of the most useful remedies that was employed. When the cold bath had been thus made use of, and immediately after followed by the spiritus mindereri or saline mixture, with plentiful dilution, it rarely failed to produce sweating in the course of fifteen minutes; and when once induced, it was easily continued by the repeti- tion of the sudorific medicines and drinks, until a solution of the fever was obtained. In some instances, where the patient refused his drink and medicines, or from the care- * Before deciding here, we must consult Dr. Currie. ■ See Dr. Jackson on the Diseases of* Jamaica. 78