4:26 GENERAL NEUROSES, OF UNKNOWN ANATOMICAL ORIGIN. 



goes on with his business quite undisturbed, taking it up where he 

 left it off. In other cases, the patient remains stunned and dizzy, for a 

 while complaining of a feeling of confusion in the head. There is 

 often but one attack ; more rarely there is a series of them, recurring 

 at varying intervals. Between the fits the health is good, unless 

 there be complications. Recovery is the most frequent termination 

 of simple catalepsy. The dread lest cataleptic patients should be buried 

 alive has become exploded in modern days. It is stated that, in some 

 cases of the disease, the length of the fits, and the frequence of their 

 recurrence, and the consequent diminution in the supply of nourish- 

 ment to the patient, have sometimes resulted in marasmus, and even 

 in death. In such cases, however, it is probable that there was a com- 

 plication of diseases. 



TREATMENT. In spite of the old caution, not to interfere too ac- 

 tively with a cataleptic fit, I should not hesitate to resort to affusion 

 of cold water, to apply a strong electric current, and, unless the respi- 

 ration and pulse should seem too feeble, to give an emetic. In a pro- 

 tracted seizure, it may become necessary to feed the patient through 

 an oesophagus tube. As the treatment of the case between the fits 

 must be addressed to their apparent cause, to any derangement in the 

 nutrition of the patient, or to any other symptom which may appear, 

 no fixed rules can be laid down for our guidance. 



CHAPTER VII. 



HYPOCHONDBIASIS. 



ETIOLOGY. Properly speaking, hypochondriasis is a disease of the 

 mind, and, in the books on psychiatria, is usually classed with melan- 

 choly, lypemania, and phrenalgia, that is, to that class of diseases in 

 which, as their names indicate, the mind of the individual is oppressed 

 by a painful impression. The hypochondriac is always plagued by 

 the idea that he is sick, or that he is going to be sick. Hence, in the 

 opinion of Guislaine, an appropriate name for the disease would be 

 pathophobia or monopathophobia. All persons who are possessed by 

 the idea that they are sick, however, are not to be regarded as hypo- 

 chondriacs, but only those in whom such an impression constitutes a 

 symptom of disease. A father of a family, who is informed by his 

 physician that he is suffering from some incurable malady, and from 

 that hour is insane upon that point, suffering constant apprehen- 

 sion, and watching his bodily condition with all the attention and anx- 

 iety of a hypochondriac, quite assumes the aspect of one laboring 

 under this disease. He is not a hypochondriac, however, for hie 



