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Such is an imperfect and hasty description of this mal-formation, and of the peculiar symptoms attending the progress of labor.

IODINE IN CONTINUED FEVER, PHARYNGITIS AND PNEUMONIA.

BY DR. G. W. HALL, CARTHAGE, ILL.

I was induced to try the effects of Iodine in continued Fever, from seeing a statement in some journal that a physician in one of the Southern States had been using it in this affliction with success. I have forgotten the name and location of the physician, and can only make this general reference.

In the first case in which I tried it, I gave it on the seventh day of the fever, after the usual remedies generally employed in a case of continued fever without any discoverable local complication, and the abortive method had been insufficient to arrest the febrile symptoms. In two days more, during which the iodine was continued, the fever, according to common parlance, was "broken," and the patient speedily convalesced, without a relapse or any untoward symptom. The next case in which I gave it, I will give more in detail.

I was called on the 10th day of April last, to see a little girl of Mr. S., aged eight years. She was taken sick on the 6th, with a chill, followed by fever, which had continued until the time I was called, without any discernible remission, so far as I could learn. Diarrhoea had set in two days before I was called. She had delirium at night, caused perhaps by a loosing exacerbation. Pulse 120, small and weak; skin hot and dry. Tenderness on pressure in the right iliac region. Tongue dry and covered with a brownish coating. No eruption. I prescribed calomel and ipicacuanha; applied a blister over the abdomen, and directed her attendants to sponge her frequently in cold water, and to apply cloths wet in cold water to her head.

Next morning there was an admixture of bile in the discharges from the bowels-tongue a little moist. Same in other respects. Five grains of quinine were ordered every three hours. No better in the evening. A mixture of turpentine and laudanum was pre

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DR. HALL-Iodine in Continued Fever.

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pared and several doses given through the night. At the morning visit next day I found her weaker; sordes were collecting on the teeth; tongue dry and fissured; diarrhoea undiminished; blister drying. At this visit I dissolved two grains of iodine, with six grains of iodide of potassium, in an ounce of water, and directed her mother to give fifteen drops every two hours. In the evening her tongue was again a little moist; discharges from the bowels not so frequent. She had no delirium that night. Next morning the tongue was cleaning, and the skin, which had previously been dry, was now moist. From this time she quickly recovered; the iodine was continued two days longer, at which time she was discharged from treatment.

I have since used it in four similar cases, and the same good results have ensued. I must say however that I doubt its always being attended with the same results. Other cases apparently similar to the above may be in more respects than one, widely different. And then owing often to some inscrutable cause, such is the diversity in the action of remedies, that we can rely with entire certainty on the powers of none. Still, I believe that in cases precisely similar to the above, the iodine would have the same effect. If others should be induced to try it, I trust they will give the profession the result of their experience. In the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal of November 16th, 1853, there is an article from Dr. A. P. Merrill, of Nashville, Tenn., in which he recommends the iodine as a local remedy of value in pharyngitis.

Since I saw that I have treated several cases with it, and I believe it acts as well and often better than the nitrate of silver. In acute tonsilitis it will be found, I think, to be more prompt in arresting the inflammatory process, than almost any other remedy. Dr. Merrill's formula is as follows:

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M. To be applied to the part affected with a camel's hair pencil. If too strong, to be diluted by adding warm water.

In the last two years I have used the iodine and iodide of potass., in many cases of pneumonia, and the cases in which it was given have recovered sooner, and done better than under any other treat

ment I have ever tried. How it acts I do not know; but certain it is that in my hands it has tended powerfully and promptly towards producing an amelioration of the symptoms and a resolution of the inflammation.

It relieves in a very favorable manner, the distressing cough, dispnoea, and heat of surface.

Carthage, Ills. July 22, 1854.

CHOLERA IN BOSTON.

BY E. B. MOORE, M. D., BOSTON, MASS.

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We are

(From a letter to one of the Editors.) now surrounded by a cholera atmosphere, and although the disease has not yet become an epidemic, yet many have fallen victims to its withering influence. Some physicians in this city and its immediate environs have been suddenly removed by it, though in the case of some the fatal end was supposed to have been induced more by mental and moral causes, than even by previous exhausting labors and cases. Proper hygienic regulations, and even a very moderate attention to personal habits, is believed to be sufficient to protect one from the disease.

As your city may become afflicted with this disease, if it has not already been visited by it, and your services will be called into requisition to stay its progress, I have thought a few suggestions as to my mode of treatment, might not be wholly uninteresting to you. You are aware that I have had considerable experience in its treatment, and that my success has been fully equal to that of any others. During the epidemic of 1849, while you were with me, you remember I had the medical charge of one of the districts of this city, where the disease was more prevalent than in any other part of the city, and that I had an ample opportunity to try the effects. of various remedies and modes of treatment, and to test their comparative efficacy; an opportunity, in fact, much more abundant and absolute, than usually falls to the lot of those physicians whose observations are restricted to the rounds of ordinary private practice, however extensive. Both during that epidemic and the present season, if called early, the disease was almost always arrested, and

this circumstance, more than any other, constitutes the turningpoint of the case.

The indications of cure are to allay the spasms, to stop the vomiting and purging, and to restore the secretions of bile and urine; these accomplished, the patient is well. To allay the spasms, and to put a stop to the vomiting, I give as follows:

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Dose, a teaspoonful every half hour, or oftener if urgent, in a little cold water, and if vomited up, to be repeated again immediately. Apply mustard paste to the epigastrium, rub the extremities with dry hot flannels, and wrap the whole body in the same. Give no drinks, except perhaps occasionally a little ice water, or a piece of ice, if thirst is urgent.

This course will freqently fulfill the first three indications. If the purging is not stopped in one-half or three-fourths of an hour, I give a quarter of a grain of Sulph. Morphiæ, made in a pill with Pulv. Acacia, every two hours, but if the case is very urgent, somewhat more frequently. In addition to hot flannels, I order bottles of hot water to the feet and about the body. As soon as the cramps, vomiting and purging are stopped, which will generally be in the course of three hours, and sometimes much sooner, I endeavor to restore the secretions of bile and urine. For this purpose, to invite the bile, I generally employ the following prescription, which though mild, rarely fails of accomplishing a favorable effect: Pulv. Opii, grs. iij

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Hydr. c. creta

Muc. Acacia

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Ft. pl. No. vj-one every two hours.

To restore the secretion of urine, I think by far the most appropriate means that can be employed, is Chlorate of Potass. which I give in five grain doses, every two hours, alternating with the pills above mentioned.

This then is the mode of treatment upon which I rely most, in my cenflicts with this fearful disease. I have not been guided in VOL. II.-NO. I.-3

the choice of this treatment by any of the numerous fancies and theories respecting the intricate character of cholera. I have simply asked myself what are its obvious phenomena, and what mode of meeting these morbid tendencies, most readily suggests itself to the consideration, and commends itself to the judgment. My individual testimony is, that this course I have found more successful than any other plan of treatment, and this consideration amply compensates for any lack of startling novelties it may possess.

This year, thus far, I have not lost a single patient with the cholera, notwithstanding I have had many cases which at first view, appeared almost desperate.

As a remedy to check the premonitory diarrhoea of cholera, and also as an excellent remedy for chronic diarrhoea supervening from other causes, I have found nothing equal to the Liquor Ferri Pernitratis, given in doses of ten to twenty drops once in three or four hours.

BOSTON, Aug. 14, 1854.

GUTTA PERCHA SPLINTS.

BY SAML. H. CASE, M. D. ONEONTA, N. Y.

For many fractures, sprains, diseased and wounded joints, where something like an immovable apparatus is required, gutta percha as a material for splints is, above all other appliances and inventions with which I am acquainted, the very thing desired. Although it is several years since it was introduced into this country and recommended to the profession for various surgical purposes, I am not aware that it has come into very general use as an article for splints; indeed the probability is that it is not very frequently used.

These splints have advantages, however, over starch, felt, or paste board, in case and facility of adaptation to the particular case in hand. They are sufficiently firm, and are not liable to be injured at all by water or any other application that the Surgeon might wish to make to the limb. They may be easily removed and re-applied whenever desirable, and altered in shape, if necessary, with very little trouble. The material is cheap and durable; it can be re

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