Hydriatic treatment of Scarlet Fever in its Different Forms Part 8

123. WANT OF WATER.

One of the obstacles is the _want of a sufficient quant.i.ty of water_ in some houses, and the difficulty of procuring it.

This obstacle is easily removed.

If you cannot procure water enough for a half-bath--for there cannot be a difficulty in procuring a pailful for wetting the sheet--give your patient a _dripping sheet_ instead, which, in most cases, will do as well; or, should there be a want of a wash-tub to give it in, a _rubbing sheet_ may supply the bath.

124. DRIPPING SHEET, SUBSt.i.tUTE FOR THE HALF-BATH.

To apply the _dripping sheet_, a tin bathing hat or a large wash-tub is placed near the patient's bed, and a pail of water on the brim of the hat, or close by the tub. Dip a linen sheet into it, and leave it there till you wish to take the patient out of his pack, but dispose it so that you can easily find the two corresponding corners. As soon as the patient steps into the hat or tub, seize the sheet by these corners and throw it over his head and body from behind, and rub him all over, head and all, whilst somebody else is supporting him, or whilst he is supporting himself by taking hold of one of the bed-posts. When the sheet becomes warm, empty part of your pail over the patient's head, by which means the water in the sheet is renewed, and rub again. Then repeat the same operation, and when all your water is gone, before the body of the patient is sufficiently cool, take water from the hat or tub and use it for the same purpose, till he is quite cooled down. Then dry him with another sheet, or a towel, and put him to bed again, if necessary.

125. RUBBING SHEET, SUBSt.i.tUTE FOR THE HALF-BATH.

It cannot be difficult to procure a wash-tub. Should you be so situated, however, as not to be able to procure even this, you will be compelled to make s.h.i.+ft with a _rubbing sheet_. For that purpose, a sheet and a pail of water are all you need. The sheet is wetted in the pail and slightly wrung out. The patient steps on a piece of oil-cloth or carpet, and you throw your wet-sheet over him and rub, as before indicated. When the sheet is warm, you dip it in the pail again, and repeat the process, and thus you go on, till the patient is sufficiently cooled.

If you can have two pails of water, it will be better than one, as the water becomes warm after having changed the sheet a couple of times.

126. WHERE THERE IS A WILL, THERE IS A WAY!

I have been frequently compelled to resort to these milder applications, when there were no bathing utensils in families or boarding-houses, or no servants to carry the water for a bath; and they have always answered very well. In cases where a sitz-bath or a half-bath is indispensable, to save the life of a patient, you will find the means of procuring bathing utensils and the necessary quant.i.ty of water.

_Where there is a will, there is a way!_--I am sure that when once your mind is made up to use the treatment, it will not be difficult for you to find the means for it. There is always water, and there are always hands enough, where there is _resolution_. And who would mind a little trouble, when he can save a fellow creature's, perhaps a darling child's life and health? As for the rest, the few days' trouble, which the hydriatic mode of treatment gives, is largely recompensed by the much shorter duration of the disease, and by the immediate relief the patient derives from almost every application of water.

I have generally found that those parents who had confidence in the treatment, had also the courage to resort to it. _Confidence and courage_ create _resolution_, and when once you have begun to treat your patient, you will be sure to persevere. _Il n'y a que le premier pas qui coute_, as the French say: only the first step is difficult.

127. PREJUDICE OF PHYSICIANS AGAINST THE WATER-CURE.

The greatest, and the most serious, difficulty lies in the prejudice of physicians against the Water-Cure. This prejudice, although in the treatment of the diseases before us, it is founded on no other reasons but ignorance, lack of courage and the habit of travelling the old trodden path--the same _regular path_ which thousands and millions have travelled not to return--neither you, dear reader, nor I, shall be able to conquer by words. But we may succeed by actions. Take the matter in your own hands, before it is too late. Do not plead your want of knowledge and experience: a whip in the hand of a child is less dangerous than a double-edged sword in the hand of a fencing-master. I have known many a mother to treat her child for scarlet-fever, measles, small-pox, croup, &c., after my books, or after prescriptions received in Graefenberg and other hydriatic establishments, and I scarcely remember a case of accident, whilst those treated in the usual mode by the best physicians would die in numbers. I repeat it: there is no danger in the _wet-sheet pack_, and should a patient die under the treatment prescribed by me, you may be sure, he would not have lived under any other mode of treatment.

128. REBELLION!

_This is preaching rebellion!_

I know it is, and it is with great reluctance that I preach it, as I am by no means in favor of taking medical matters out of the hands where they belong, to place them into the hands of such as have had no medical education. I despise quackery, and I wish physicians could be prevailed upon to take the matter in their own hands. But, the following anecdote will enable you to judge what we may expect in that quarter, and whether I am justified in preaching rebellion against the old routine--for I deny going against science and the profession--and for a new practice which has proved to be safer than any hitherto adopted.

129. FACTS.

In 1845-46 there was an epidemic in Dresden, a city of 100,000 inhabitants, where I then resided. Its ravages in the city and the densely peopled country around it, were dreadful. We had excellent physicians of different schools, who exerted themselves day and night to stop the progress of extermination, but all was in vain. Dying children and weeping mothers were found in some house of every street, and whenever you entered a dry-goods store, you were sure to find people buying mourning. At last, as poverty will frequently produce dispute and quarrel in families, there arose, from similar reasons, a dispute between the different sects of physicians in the papers, which became more and more animated and venomous, without having any beneficial influence upon the dying patients. Sad with the result of the efforts, and disgusted with the quarrel of the profession, I gathered facts of my own and other hydriatic physicians' practice, by which it was shown that I alone, in upwards of one hundred cases of scarlatina, I had treated, had not lost a patient, and that, in general, not a case of death of scarlet-fever treated hydriatically was on record. These facts, with some observations about the merits of the respective modes of treatment, I published in the same papers, offering to give the list of the patients, I had treated, and to teach my treatment, gratis, to any physician who would give himself the trouble of calling.--What do you think was the result of my communication and offer?

The quarrel in the papers was stopped at once; not a line was published more; no one attempted to contradict me or to show that I had lost patients also; all was dead silence; and of the one hundred and fifty physicians of the city, _one_ called, and, not finding me at home, never returned. And the patients? Well, the patients were treated and killed--after the occurrence I thought I had the right to use the word--as before, and the practice was continued in every epidemy afterwards.

Perhaps my communications would have had a better result in America, where physicians, though much less learned upon an average, are more accessible to new ideas?--

130. I have tried, several years ago, to have an article on the subject inserted in one or two of the New-York papers, which have the largest circulation in the country, but, although there were at the time 150 deaths of scarlet-fever per week in the city, they had so much to say about slavery and temperance that there was no room for my article, and when I published it in the Water-Cure Journal, it was, of course, scarcely noticed.--Scarlet-patients have continued to be treated and to die as before, and when I published a couple of months ago an extract from this pamphlet in the Boston Medical World, there were thirty cases of death per week from scarlatina in that city.

These are facts, upon which you may make your own comments. But the following are facts also:

131. MORE FACTS!

I have been treating several hundred cases of eruptive fevers during twenty-one years, and except the one mentioned above (111.) never lost a patient. I have known similar results, in the practice of other hydriatic physicians who employed a similar method. I scarcely remember a bad result of hydriatic treatment undertaken by the parents and relations of the patient, without the a.s.sistance of any physician at all. I know of several cases of death, in scarlatina, where physicians attempted to employ Currie's method, without packing;[38] and I have frequently seen the learning of regular physicians interfere with our simple practice and produce different results, whilst people without medical knowledge, by strictly adhering to my prescriptions, would always be successful. I have been so successful, and am so confident in the treatment, as described, that I have not only neglected to vaccinate my children (till last year, when it was done by a friend in my absence), but that I have sent them to a scarlet-patient to take the disease, in order that I might be able to treat them myself, and know them to be protected in future.

132. CONCLUSION: HELP YOURSELVES, IF YOUR PHYSICIANS WILL NOT HELP YOU!

And I am none of your water-enthusiasts, who pretend to cure everything and any thing with water. My confidence in the hydriatic treatment of eruptive fevers, however, is almost unlimited, because it is founded on an experience of many years of happy results with scarcely any exception, and on the fact that no other method can show a similar result.

I have always been considered an honest man, dear reader, and always anxious to serve my fellow-men; and what selfish view could I have in thus attempting to persuade you to save your children's lives by adopting my method of treatment? I shall neither make friends with the members of the profession by thus exciting you to rebel against the old routine, nor shall I augment the number of the patients of my establishment; for we cannot very well carry patients with scarlet-fever and small-pox to a distant inst.i.tution. Believe me, I have no other object in publis.h.i.+ng this pamphlet, than that of saving the life and health of as many human beings as possible, which otherwise would perish. In publis.h.i.+ng this pamphlet, I intend to perform a sacred duty, without any regard to making a pleasant or unpleasant impression upon my brother physicians, and consequently without any regard to my own interest.

The fact that I exposed my own youngest children, the pleasure, and the support _in spe_, of my declining age, to the contagion of scarlatina, during an epidemic which had rather a malignant character, proves more than any thing my honest confidence in my own remedy. Ask your physician, if he is adverse to the hydriatic method, whether he knows a remedy in which he has so much confidence as to be willing to imitate my example. There is no such remedy in the apothecary's shop, and there is no physician who would expose his own children to the contagion of scarlatina from the confidence he has in the curative or protective powers _of any drug_.

I hope, my brother-physicians will believe me, when I a.s.sure them, that I do not mean any disrespect to the profession, in thus introducing a new sound method for the weak old routine. Perhaps, my exposition of the principles of my practice, and the attempt at a systematic arrangement of the materials at my disposal, may gain a few converts. If I am not mistaken, this pamphlet is the first that treats the subject systematically and to some extent. I am aware that it might be better written and more perfect. But, I trust that it will do some good, and hope it will pave the way for a better production, based on a more extensive practice and enriched with new discoveries on the part of American physicians, whose genius and activity are not inferior to those of any other nation.

When the Hydriatic System becomes more and more a part of the practice of educated and enlightened pract.i.tioners, it will become a much greater benefit to the human race, not only with regard to the cure of eruptive fevers, but of that of all diseases to which it can be adapted, beside the happy reform it will a.s.sist in bringing about in our effeminate and luxurious way of living, which, at all times, has been a source of ruin for individuals, families and nations.

But as long as the profession continues in its old routine, I can give you no other advice than that of following my prescriptions and of helping yourselves:--

"Aide-toi, et le ciel t'aidera!"

FOOTNOTES:

[37] I speak here of the true erysipelas, of course, and not of the chronic eruption of the face, &c., erroneously called erysipelas by many.

[38] I think of the obstinacy of a medical friend, who refused to take a lesson from Priessnitz, and constantly looked for advice, in cases of need, in works written by learned pract.i.tioners. He lost three patients in one family from scarlatina anginosa, which would certainly have been cured by the packs. In two other cases I was called to his a.s.sistance, when he insisted upon putting ice upon the head of the patients to remove the affection of the brain (the reaction was sthenic! See 50). I told him that in the cases before us, repeated packing was the only safe application, and we had a few unpleasant words, when I yielded, promising him that he would come round to my opinion within a few hours.

And so it was; the patients grew worse and worse, with their heads shaved and ice upon them, till my good friend requested me to take the rudder in my own hand, with the promise not to interfere any more. By packing, the patients improved visibly and were out of danger within two days.