aS Pe ae 
BOTANIC PHYSICIAN. 
+ 
_ INFLAMMATION OF THE LIVER. 
he liver is less subject to inflammation than most of the other 
‘a, asin it the circulation is slower ; but when inflammation does _ 
happen, it is with difficulty removed, and often ends in suppuration. 
or schirrus.. This disease is more common in warm climates. — < 
~ IT cannot approve. of the prevalent fashion in physic, of christen- 
_ing almost every painful affection within the abdomen, a “ Liver 
~ Complaint.’’ It leads toa wrong treatment. For instance, many, to 
my knowledge, have been dosed with the blwe pill for months, or 
undergone a mercurial salivation, for this “ liver complaint ;” when, 
as I believed, and as afterwards proved to be the case, their 
whole disease, aside from the destructive effects of the mineral, cou- 
sted in mere debility and flatulency. No wonder that.under such 
, these “liver complaints” prove obstinate and incurable ! 
thing could be given more injurious.. Thousands of females in 
this country, and I might-even say, in this city, are. now groaning 
— under this relentless ‘ liver complaint,’”? and. continually taking me- 
dicine for it, when their real disease is an inflammation, swelling, or 
_ bearing down of the womb, This I assert from experience. 
iS Causes.—Besides the common causes of inflammation, we may 
os add: excessive fatness, schirrus of the liver, violent shocks, any 
_ thing that suddenly cools the liver after being greatly heated, stones — 
ructing the course of the bile, strong wines, hot spicy aliment, — 
__ Jong continued intermittent fevers, blows, and in five cases gut of six, — 
_ the partial application of cold or wet when the body is heated or over 
FS i. 
= $eGee 
~. Symproms.—This disease is known by a painful tension of the 
tight side under the false ribs, attended with some degree of fever, 
a sense of weight, or fulness of the part, difficulty of breathing, loath — 
ing of food, great thirst, with a pale or yellowish color of the skio 
and eyes. ; eee 
The symptoms here are various, according to the degree of inflam- 
mation, or the particular part affected: Sometimes the pain iso 
Anconsiderable that an inflammation is not so much as suspected; — 
but when it happens in the upper or convex part of the liver, the — 
more acute, the pulse quicker, and the patient often tré 
dry cough, a hiccup, and a pain extending to the shoule 
h diffic of lying on the left side. Sf 
this disease may he distinguished from the pleurisy by the pam 
being fess violent and seated under the false ribs. It may also be. : 
shed from hysteric and hypochondriac disorders, by th 
: fever with which it is accompanied. In warm climates the Hit 
"More apt to be affected, as the secretion of bile is increased and it 
__ is Hiable to become acrid, thereby excitingirritation. ~ e 
___ This disease is seldom mortal.~~A constant hiecupping, violent 
fever, and excessivethirst, are all bad symptoms. When a schir 
he liver is formed, the patient, if he observes a proper reg 
