pie ee hOB uF 
MEDICAL REPORT. 
DtsEases wnd Casuartiks occurring inthe public and private Practice 
Report 0 
[June 1, 
of the Physician who has the cure of the Western District of the City Dispensary. 
——— 
"THE writer scarcely remembers, in a 
given time, such an exceeding preva- 
lence of measles as during the period that 
has passed since the last report. In his 
own practice he has met with no cases that 
have required any vigilance beyond what 
s ordinarily necessary in these insidious 
maladies, but some of his medical friends 
have told him of much malignancy in the 
aspect, and virulence in the character, of 
several cases which have been subjected to 
their inspection. ; 
Much mistake still domestically obtains 
in reference to the management of measles. 
A parent yesterday asked the reporter’s 
opinion respecting the nature of her 
child’s complaint, and, upon being informed 
it was the measles, instantly exclaimed, 
«then I will take care to keep the infant 
warm,—and may I give freely of syrup of 
saffron in order to send the eruption out?” 
Such, it will be recollected, was the com- 
mon language, and such the widely destruc- 
tive practice, of some years since in small- 
pox. Now, although the application of 
cold in measles is not admissible with so 
free and fearless a latitude as it is in the 
other distemper just named ; and that on 
-aecount of the catarrhal irritation which is 
almost invatiably present ; yet, let it be re- 
collected, that the notion of throwing out 
the disorder upon the surface by heating 
applications and alexiphatmic medicinals is 
for the most part not only false in itself, but 
calculated to lead; to much practical error, 
It isan expedient which should never be re- 
sorted to by other than strictly medical 
‘professors, and in certain cases of fearful 
collapse, the indications of treatment for 
the, most. part being precisely the reverse 
of stimulation. Inrespect of temperature, 
the medium poiat should, in the generality 
of cases, be adopted, not raising it up so 
high as to increase irritation and fever—not 
letting it down so low as to render proba- 
ble a repulsion from the surface to the 
internal membranes. Inflammation of the 
lungs is the great thing to be apprehended 
in measles; and many instances of con- 
firmed consumption have, it is to be feared, 
their commencement in that kind’ and 
degree of pulmonary disturbance which is 
too often an accompaniment or sequela of 
this affection. “If your convalescent bark 
but once, fear lest there be a murderer 
within; and, though dislodged, expect him 
again,—he now knows the way.” 
“To prescribe purgatives in order to rid 
the little patients from the “dregs” of the 
distemper, is to prove that the dregs of the 
‘hamoral doctrines still hang about the 
-mind ofthe prescriber ; but, it is: more than 
probable, that tie notion, like sound mo- 
rality in false religion, is practically good, 
although theoretically, perhaps, incorrect. 
Cathartics ‘iave’ a manifest tendency to 
divert the current of disorder from the 
pulmonary organs; and, it isrepeated, that 
any thing, which safely insures this.effect, 
either during the violence of the conflict, 
or when the consequences of the malady, 
rather than the malady itself, shall be pre- 
sent, is likely to prove productive of good, 
Let us then be carefal that the three-dose 
superstition of our predecessors and present 
gtand-mamma, prescribers be not, suc- 
ceeded by a freedom of thinking and fear- 
lessness of conduct that may, proye our 
newly adopted creed to be as wide from 
truth, and as far from good, as that upon 
which we are so ready to pour out the full 
Stream of censure and ridicule. Jt is sel- 
dom that those are the most successful. re- 
formists who are the most lavish in their 
condemnation of former practices, 
Fevers are rushing in among us with 
force and frequency, owing probably to the 
sudden succession of extremely hot wea- 
ther upon the cold of the preceding weeks, 
a-circumstance which proves, say some, 
the inflammatory character of the disorder, 
and the proposition is in one sense correct ; 
but, in the due appreciation of febrile pa- 
thology, something beside inflammation 
must be taken into account, and the pu- 
trescent hypotheses of the “olden time” 
were not more pregnant with mischievous 
consequences than those theories which 
teach, that, in all cases of actual fever, to 
bring forward the lancet and to hold back 
stimulus, is to sign the safety-warrant of the 
sufferer. 
The Reporter still continues to employ 
small and gradually augmented doses of 
digitalis in those affections of children, 
which, while they partake of general tor- 
por and weakness, are often accompanied 
by symptoms of local action; and it is suy- 
prizing to witness, under this treatment, 
-how satisfactorily the tone of the system 
occasionally becomes improved, while the 
irritation of the part subsides ; indeed, this 
subsidence of topical inflammation under 
some circumstances results as a direct ef- 
fect from getting the main springs of the 
constitution into due power and uninter- 
rupted play; and it is a mistake, as it has 
been often intimated, to suppose, that the 
remedial process in all sorts and grades of 
inflammation is the process of diminishing 
strength. Those coughs of children which 
follow eruptive disorders, (that more espe- 
cially to which allusion has just’ been 
maue,) are most mnequivocally benefited by 
the medicine in question, and under its ad- 
ministration we shall often find the pulse 
at 
