Koch's bacillus has been found in the nasal secretions of healthy hospital nurses, and of students of medicine, as noted by Strauss. Would it not be possible to come across it accidentally in certain kinds of expectoration, just as the pneumococcus is found in saliva?
In one of the numbers of La Médecine Moderne of last year there appeared a short article on the "Influenzas known as pseudo-phymic." The writer remarked on the strong analogy which certain complications of pulmonary influenza presented to acute tuberculosis. He observed, among other forms: 1st, the influenzal bronchitis which affected one of the summits of the lung, the most difficult form to diagnose from tuberculosis; 2d, the broncho-pneumonic form; 3d, the pleuro-pneumonic form, bearing a close resemblance to tuberculous pleurisy. I might remark that this last form is still little known and ill-defined. The influenza microbe always imitates to a remarkable degree the microbe of tuberculosis in certain instances; and if we wish to effect a cure on the laws laid down by Hahnemann in certain forms of influenzal bronchitis, we must frequently seek for the simillimum in the virus of tuberculosis.
I have mentioned oppression as one of the characteristics of Bacillinum. Now influenzal bronchitis is markedly accompanied by an incessant cough and by grave general symptoms. There is more frequently acute than passive, obstructive and dyspnœic congestion. I am inclined to prefer Aviaire to Bacillinum in such cases, and I should like to briefly touch upon certain cases in my practice.
I have under my care a little girl of twelve years of age who has for two years developed an influenza which rapidly leads to pulmonary symptoms, always distinctly localized in the top of the left lung. The mother is tuberculous, and the child, who was born with forceps, has her left chest less developed than her right. The congestion which accompanies the influenza is sudden and severe; within twenty-four hours the lung is invaded, and fine râles are soon heard. Twice running, at intervals of a year, Aviaire 100th has stifled the symptoms in a few days. I have seen an analogous case, only with congestion of the base of the lung.
In my clinical report of the Hôpital St. Jacques (in August, 1895) I note ten cases of acute influenzal bronchitis with incessant cough, fever, and expectoration, rapidly cured with Aviaire. This year I have prescribed it with the same success as at the Hôpital St. Jacques in cases of influenzal bronchitis, with active congestion. I will mention two cases of the pulmonary complications of measles which were rapidly dissipated by this remedy; but I must also mention a third case of measles in which Aviaire failed and Bryonia proved successful. The child had an acute rubeolic laryngitis, and few pulmonary symptoms. Bryonia was in this case more decidedly indicated than Aviaire.
The dilution of Aviaire which I have always used is the 100th. I give usually five drops a day.
It seems that Aviaire does not act in diminishing the cough like an anodyne or a narcotic, but braces up the whole organism. The relief of debility and the return of appetite are the phenomena which I have observed in conjunction with the diminution of the cough.
I have given Aviaire 100th for weeks, and even for a month, regularly every day, without having observed excitement or aggravation. It would thus appear to be a remedy of long-lasting action, capable in certain cases of modifying the organism, and of bracing a constitution which has become enfeebled from the effects of influenza or of suspicious bronchitis.
In contrast with Bacillinum I have noted, in my observations on Aviaire, considerable cough and little dyspnœa—an acute inflammatory, extremely irritating cough, such as one meets with in acute diseases or sub-acute affections in young people; a cough which fatigues, and which leads to enfeeblement and loss of appetite—in a word, a suspicious cough. To conclude my remarks, the utility of Aviaire in suspicious bronchitis—an expression on which I again lay stress—I will recall certain indubitable examples of the cure (at the Hôpital St. Jacques) of bronchitis or of pulmonary congestion at the top of one of the lungs, or of bronchitis on one side only, or of congestion predominating on one side. These localizations on one side are sufficiently grave symptoms to warrant apprehension of the hatching of tuberculosis.
If I were myself attacked, as the result of influenza or measles, or of some weakening malady, with an incessant tickling and stubborn cough, with certain closely localized pulmonary symptoms; if I lost my strength and appetite; if, in a word, I were attacked by bronchitis whose upshot was highly doubtful, and which caused apprehension of tuberculosis, I should not hesitate a single moment, with the examples which I have had before me, to try Aviaire 100th upon myself.