The coryza, tonsillitis, laryngitis, bronchitis are to be treated according to general principles, if they require treatment at all. In most mild cases the catarrhal symptoms call for no special measures of treatment.
Free inunctions of fatty substances about the brow and over the bridge of the nose are of use as regards the coryza. For this purpose animal fats, washed lard, simple cerate, cold cream, and the like are to be preferred to cosmoline and vaseline.
Morphine dissolved in cherry-laurel water, one part in fifty or sixty, is useful for the relief of the head-pains associated with the coryza. A few drops may be snuffed up from time to time. These pains are mitigated to some degree by wearing a flannel cap or wrapping the head in a silk handkerchief. Warm applications sometimes give comfort, while cold almost invariably add to the distress.
Distress in the upper air-passages and the tickling cough call for steam inhalations, and the air of the apartment may be rendered moist by the evaporation of water kept boiling in a broad, shallow vessel. Gargles of potassium chlorate, or potassium chlorate with sumac, exert a soothing influence upon the congested tonsils.
Severe cases call for more energetic measures of treatment. The most prominent indications are the control of the fever; the diminution of the hyperæmic fluxion to the mucous tracts; measures of support; the mitigation of pain and the induction of sleep; and, finally, the prevention of the pulmonary congestion, to which the depression leads by enfeeblement of the circulation. The last indication is especially urgent in infants, the very old, and those previously debilitated from any cause.
Inflammatory complications require special treatment or modifications of treatment.
The febrile movement is not, as a rule, high; grave nervous symptoms and serious catarrh may be associated with moderate fever.
An anti-febrile regimen is to be observed. The moderate duration of this fever, as compared with enteric fever, renders it less important that large amounts of fever-food should be given, while the tendency to depression makes it of the utmost importance that the administration of food be systematic and carefully looked after by the medical attendant. The disinclination to take food is so great that it is often with difficulty that a sufficient quantity can be given in the early days of the attack, and it is to be doubted whether benefit follows anything in excess of the most moderate amount. It is necessary to observe regular hours, as in the management of all the low fevers. As soon as convalescence begins the patient should be urged to eat; the quantity of food taken at one time is to be augmented, and the intervals between the meals may be longer.
A favorable action upon the excretory function of the skin and kidneys will result from the moderate drinking of water or of the beverages already spoken of. At least enough fluid should be taken to relieve thirst.
Diaphoretics have been much used, upon the theory that by determination to the skin they correspondingly diminish the tendency to hyperæmia of the affected mucous tracts. Dover's powder, solution of the acetate of ammonia, and other mild diaphoretics are to be selected. Jaborandi should be employed with caution. The wet pack and other hydrotherapeutic measures have been employed to act upon the skin and to effect a direct reduction of temperature in influenza. For old and feeble persons warm packs are employed. A profuse sweating at the onset of the attack is said to occasionally cut it short. Early diaphoresis often brings about a rapid and lasting amelioration of the symptoms. It is to be borne in mind that the fever is rarely excessive, and that sweating is not infrequently a troublesome symptom. In some epidemics it has been a very troublesome one.