Feeding the Convalescent
When an individual is recovering from an illness the appetite often becomes excessively active, and his demands for food, if yielded to by the family or attendant, may produce digestive derangements from which recovery is slow.
On the other hand, too much food is often urged on the convalescent from a mistaken idea that large quantities of food are necessary in order to rebuild the enfeebled system.
Care must be taken not to return too rapidly to a solid diet when a liquid diet has been followed for some time. The digestive system shares in the general weakness and must not be overloaded.
The more easily digested foods, as ice cream, milk, tapioca, crackers and cream or cream toast, cream soups and meat broths thickened with bread crumbs rolled from toasted bread, custards, stewed fruits, corn meal, mush, in some conditions, cornstarch blancmange, boiled rice, and poached eggs may be given.
Later, when meat is added to the diet it should be scraped or finely minced so as to give the stomach as little work as possible until it regains its tone.
Potatoes, if allowed, should be baked or mashed.
Sweetbreads in cream, sponge cake or lady fingers with light cream may also be allowed.
At least a week should be taken in returning to a solid diet and the orders of the physician must be strictly followed. Pickles, nuts, or solid meats should not be allowed. They will often occasion a return of fever and possibly a relapse.
After typhoid fever or other lingering illness, the appetite is usually much increased, but great care must be exercised not to allow solid food before the condition of the stomach and intestines shows that danger is past. It is usual not to allow solid food in typhoid fever for two weeks after the fever has disappeared.