Forty Years in the Wilderness of Pills and Powders / Cogitations and Confessions of an Aged Physician

by William A. Alcott

It was a cold, spring day, and in order to keep up a proper temperature in her room, I had no doubt that a little fire was needful. But instead of a heat of 65° in the morning and something more in the afternoon, I found her sitting in a temperature, at ten o'clock in the forenoon, of not less than 75° or 80°. On inquiry, I was surprised to find that the temperature of her room was seldom much lower than this, and that sometimes it was much higher. I was still more surprised when I ascertained that she slept at night in a small room adjoining her sitting-room, and that a fire was kept all night in the latter, for her special benefit.

No wonder her cough was habitually severe! No wonder she was subject to hemorrhage, from the irritated vessels of the lungs! The wonder was that she was not worse. The greatest wonder of all was, however, that two sensible physicians should, for weeks if not for months, have overlooked this circumstance. For I could not learn, on inquiry, that a single word had been said by either of them on the subject.

If you should be inclined to ask whether she had no exercise in the more open and pure air, either on horseback or in a carriage, the reply would be, none at all. Horseback exercise was even regarded as hazardous, and other forms of exertion had not been urged, or, that I could learn, so much as recommended.

I was anxious to meet her physicians, that I might communicate my views and feelings directly to them; but as this was not convenient I gave such directions as the nature of the case seemed to require, requesting them to follow my advice till the arrival of her physicians, and then to lay the whole case before them. My advice was, to reduce the temperature of the sitting-room as low as possible, and yet not produce a sensation of chilliness, and to have her sleeping-room absolutely cold, taking care to protect her body, however, by proper covering. I also recommended exercise in the open air, such as she could best endure; and withal, a plain, unstimulating diet.

What was done, I never knew for many months. At last, however, I met with a neighbor of the family, one day, who told me that the young woman's physicians entirely approved of my suggestions, and that by following them out for some time, she partially recovered her wonted measure of health.

Whether she recovered entirely, I never knew. The far greater probability is, that she remained more comfortable through the summer and autumn, but that the injudicious management of the next winter and spring reduced her to her former condition, or to a condition much worse. People are exceedingly forgetful even of their dearest rights and interests. They may, perhaps, exert themselves in the moment of great and pressing danger; but as soon as the danger appears to be somewhat over they relapse into their former stupidity.

There is, however, much reason for believing that consumptive people might often live on many years beyond their present scanty limit, could they be made to feel that their recovery depends, almost wholly, on a strict obedience to the laws of health, and not on taking medicine. If Miss H., by strict obedience, could recover from a dangerous condition, and enjoy six or eight months of tolerable health, is it not highly probable, to say the least, that a rigid pursuance of the same course would have kept her from a relapse into her former low and dangerous condition?

It is in this way, as I suppose, that consumption is to be cured, if cured at all. It is to be postponed. In some cases it can be postponed one year; in some, five years; in some, ten, fifteen, or twenty; in a few, forty or fifty. It is in this respect with consumption, however, as it is with other diseases. In a strictly pathological sense, no disease is ever entirely cured. In one way or another its effects are apt to be permanent. The only important difference, in this particular, between consumption and other diseases, is, that since the lungs are vital organs, more essential to life and health than some other organs or parts, the injury inflicted on them is apt to be deeper, and more likely to shorten, with certainty, the whole period of our existence.

Connected with this subject, viz., the treatment of consumption, there is probably much more of quackery than in any other department of disease which could possibly be mentioned. One individual who makes pretensions to cure, in this formidable disease, and who has written and spoken very largely on the subject, heralds his own practice with the following proclamation: "Five thousand persons cured of consumption in one year, by following the directions of this work." Another declares he has cured some sixty or seventy out of about one hundred and twenty patients of this description, for whom he has been called to prescribe.

Now, if by curing this disease is meant the production of such changes in the system, that it is no more likely to recur than to attack any other person who has not yet been afflicted with it, then such statements or insinuations as the foregoing are not merely groundless, but absolutely and unqualifiedly false, and their authors ought to know it. For I have had ample opportunity of watching their practice, and following it up to the end, and hence speak what I know, and testify what I have seen. But if they only mean by cure, the postponement of disease for a period of greater or less duration, then the case is altered; though, in that case, what becomes of their skill? No book worthy of the name can be consulted by a consumptive person without his deriving from it many valuable hints, which if duly attended to may assist him in greatly prolonging his days; and the same may be said of the prescriptions of the physician. Yet, I repeat, it is a misnomer, in either case, to call the improvement a cure.