The Female Physician / Containing all the diseases incident to that sex, in virgins, wives, and widows; together with their causes and symptoms, their degrees of danger, and respective methods of prevention and cure: to which is added, the whole art of new improv'd midwifery; comprehending the necessary qualifications of a midwife, and particular directions for laying women, in all cases of difficult and preternatural births; together with the diet and regimen of both the mother and child.

by John Maubray

HOWEVER, the Cure of this SYMPTOM depends chiefly upon a good Regimen of DIET, and external, as well as internal Corroboratives.

IN short, having thus discuss’d the several SYMPTOMS of the Nine Months, and such as are most common and familiar to the Woman during her Foetura, or the whole Time of her CHILD-BEARING; I shall proceed now in the next Place with all due Method and peculiar Regard for her Good.

CHAP. XXVIII.
Of Acute DISEASES incident to the CHILD-BEARING WOMAN.

IT sometimes, and more than too often, happens, that besides the common SYMPTOMS of the Months, the conceiv’d Woman is also suddenly taken with some acute DISEASE or other; upon which I shall offer my sincere Opinion, and according to the best of my Judgment, give a brief Account of Those several Maladies, with their Definition and Cause, Nature and Quality, Danger and Cure.

FIRST then, the great Galen defines acute DISEASES to be such, whose Motion is swift, attended with sudden and immediate Danger.

THE learned Brassavole calls such DISEASES Acute, as come suddenly, continue a short Time, and have very severe or violent SYMPTOMS.

THE ingenious Blancard calls those DISEASES Acute, which are over in a little Time, but not without imminent Danger. Now Those are deem’d either very Acute, or most Acute; the latter is meant when the Distemper is over the 4th Day; but the former is that which continues till the 7th Day: For the more acute the DISEASE is, the sooner follows its Determination, either for Life or Death. Again, a Disease is call’d simply acute, when it lasts 14 or 21 Days; or lastly, it is term’d Acute ex decidentiâ, which lasts 42 Days at least.

AND according to the diligent Dr. Sydenham[^[82]], the Despumation of Acute DISEASES happens in 336 Hours; which he also justly applies to intermitting FEVERS, reckoning 5 Hours and a half for a Paroxysm: Because what we call Days in Acute Fevers, are so many Periods in intermitting Fevers: The only difference of Those consisting in that the one perfects its Fermentation at once, which the other accomplishes at reiterated Times, and divers Turns, by the same Duct of Nature. He farther still, observes that Autumnal Quartan Fevers continue six Months; in which Time, if the Number of the recurrent Paroxysms be summed up, they will exactly amount to the aforesaid 336 Hours, or 14 Days, which is the Term or End of the regular and continual Fevers of that Season.

AND the wise Hippocrates observes[^[83]] that as an exquisite continual Fever ceases within the 7th Day, so an exquisite Tertian has seven periodical Circuits; because every Access in the latter, makes up a Day in the former Case. Hence it is manifest that all Epidemick Diseases have their due and regular Times[^[84]] of encreasing, continuing, and decreasing; and that These Laws of Nature are so constant and permanent, that however Fevers differ in other Circumstances, they are equal as to the Duration of Time; counting according to the Periods or Fits of the intermitting, and the continued Number of Days of the never intermitting Fever.