Advice to the people in general, with regard to their health

by S. A. D. Tissot

16. A great Number suffered a singular Alteration in their Voice, different from that which occurs in common Quinsies, the Inside of their Nostrils being extremely dry.

17. The Sick recovered with more Difficulty after this, than after the common Quinsies: and if they were negligent or irregular, during their Recovery; particularly, if they exposed themselves too soon to the Cold, a Relapse ensued, or some different Symptoms; such as a Stuffing with Oppression, a Swelling of the Belly, windy Swellings in different Parts; Weakness, Loathings, Ulcerations behind the Ears, and something of a Cough and Hoarseness.

18. I have been sent for to Children, and also to some young Folks, who, at the End of several Weeks, had been taken with a general Inflammation of the whole Body, attended with great Oppression, and a considerable Abatement of their Urine, which was also high-coloured and turbid, or without Separation. They seemed also in a very singular State of Indifference, or Disregard, with Respect to any Object, or Circumstance. I recovered every one of them entirely by Blisters, and the Powder [Nº. 25]. The first Operation of this Medicine was to vomit them: to this succeeded a Discharge by Urine, and at last very plentiful Sweating, which compleated the Cure. Two Patients only, of a bad Constitution, who were a little ricketty, and disposed to glandular Scirrhosity or Knottiness, relapsed and died, after being recovered of the Disease itself for some Days.

§ 118. I have bled some adult Persons, and made Use of the cooling Regimen, as long as there was an evident Inflammation: it was necessary after this to unload the first Passages; and at last to excite moderate Sweats. The same Powders [Nº. 25] have often effected both these Discharges, and with entire Success. In other Cases I have made Use of Ipecacuanha, as directed [Nº. 35].

In some Subjects there did not appear any inflammatory Symptom; and the Distemper resulted solely from a Load of putrid Matter in the first Passages. Some Patients also discharged Worms. In such Cases I never bled; but the Vomit had an excellent Effect, at the very Onset of the Disease; it produced a perceivable Abatement of all the Symptoms; Sweating ensued very kindly and naturally, and the Patient recovered entirely a few Hours after.

§ 119. There were some Places, in which no Symptom or Character of Inflammation appeared; and in which it was necessary to omit Bleeding, which was attended with bad Consequences.

I never directed Infants to be bled. After opening the first Passages, Blisters and diluting Drinks proved their only Remedies. A simple Infusion of Elder Flowers, and those of the Lime Tree, has done great Service to those who drank plentifully of it.

§ 120. I am sensible that in many Villages a great Number of Persons have died, with a prodigious Inflation or Swelling of the Neck. Some have also died in the City, and among others a young Woman of twenty Years of Age, who had taken nothing but hot sweating Medicines and red Wine, and died the fourth Day, with violent Suffocations, and a large Discharge of Blood from the Nose. Of the great Number I have seen in Person, only two died. One was a little Girl of ten Months old. She had an Efflorescence which very suddenly disappeared: at this Time I was called in; but the Humour had retreated to the Breast, and rendered her Death inevitable. The other was a strong Youth from sixteen to seventeen Years old, whose sudden Attack from the Disease manifested, from the very Beginning, a violent Degree of it. Nevertheless, the Symptoms subsiding, and the Fever nearly terminating, the Sweats which approached would probably have saved him. But he would not suffer them to have their Course, continually stripping himself quite naked. The Inflammation was immediately repelled upon the Lungs, and destroyed him within the Space of thirty Hours. I never saw a Person die with so very dry a Skin. The Vomit affected him very little upwards, and brought on a purging. His own bad Conduct seems to have been the Occasion of his Death; and may this serve as one Example of it.

§ 121. I chose to expatiate on this Disease, as it may happen to reach other Places, where it may be useful to have been apprized of its Marks, and of its Treatment, which agrees as much with that of putrid Fevers, of which I shall speak hereafter, as with that of the inflammatory Diseases I have already considered: since in some Subjects the Complaint of the Throat has evidently been a Symptom of a putrid Fever, rather than of the chiefly apparent Disease, a Quinsey. [³¹]

§ 122. Disorders of the Throat are, with Respect to particular Persons, an habitual Disease returning every Year, and sometimes oftner than once a Year. They may be prevented by the same Means, which I have directed for the Preservation from habitual Pleurisies [§ 100]; and by defending the Head and the Neck from the Cold; especially after being heated by Hunting, or any violent Exercise, or even by singing long and loud, which may be considered as an extraordinary Exercise of some of the Parts affected in this Disease.