All this may sound foolish in the extreme. Yet there are many other things equally foolish in the practice of medicine. And if zone analgesia will do what we claim for it, it may well be taken gently by the hand, lifted out of the foolish class, and placed among the ultra-sensible procedures—where, by right, it belongs.
CHAPTER 7. ZONE THERAPY FOR WOMEN.
In the eternal fitness of things there would be something radically wrong if zone therapy did not offer some especial and particular help to women. It is a satisfaction to state that the eternal fitness of things is right, as usual. For zone therapy is as unique in this connection as in most of its other applications.
Many of the things it does are positively startling. And yet they become commonplace, after one has been in the work for a time. One of the most striking cases that has yet come to my attention came in the form of a letter of thanks from a mother of a young girl. I never saw either. The mother, however, wrote me that her daughter, who had not menstruated in ten months, was, some time ago, instructed by a patient of mine to take the broad handle of a tablespoon and make strong pressure upon the tongue (a tongue depressor shown in Fig. [17] would be more appropriate), as far back as she could stand it without gagging.
She did so, and within five minutes was menstruating profusely, yet without the slightest pain or discomfort. In the several months which had since intervened, she “came around” regularly every twenty-eight days. The mother who feared that her daughter was going into a decline, could not refrain from writing me a most heartfull letter of appreciation for what my patient, through my instruction, had been able to do for her daughter. I call this good preventive medicine.
Fig. 17. Tongue-pressor Electrode. May be used with or without electricity.