A dictionary of practical medicine : comprising general pathology, the nature and treatment of diseases ... with numerous prescriptions ... a classification of diseases ... a copious bibliography, with references; and an appendix of approved formulae / ... By James Copland.
- James Copland
- Date:
- 1844-58
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A dictionary of practical medicine : comprising general pathology, the nature and treatment of diseases ... with numerous prescriptions ... a classification of diseases ... a copious bibliography, with references; and an appendix of approved formulae / ... By James Copland. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Lamar Soutter Library, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Lamar Soutter Library at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.
118/1070 (page 110)
![petite returned. It was ultimately removed per- manently by the hydrarcr. ciim creta, combined with soda, taken at bed-time, and a turpentine draught in the morning of each tliird or fourth day. Leeches were applied over the epigastric region ; and either the tartar emetic ointment, or liniment, was rubbed upon the same situation till a copious eruption of pimples was produced. The strictest regulation of the diet was enjoined. 18. D. In the varietii attended with partial or general regurgitation, or vomiting of the food taken in excessive quantity, the best effects will result from obliging the patient to abstain almost altogether from food, or to take a small portion of nourishment in the least possible bulk. Great distress from hunger will be felt for a few days, but this will gradually subside. In the instructive case published by Dr. Crane, this plan was per- sisted in; and portable soup, made into pills, was given, as the only nourishment, for several weeks : the patient recovered perfectly. A nearly similar treatment had been previously employed by Mr. Wastell with success. (Mem. of Med. Soc. of Land., vol. iii. No. 2.) Where, however, the stomach is not so irritable as to throw oflf any portion of the ingesta, and has become distended and enlarged from habitual ingurgitation, a gra- dual diminution of the food will be better borne, and perhaps be more efficacious, than its sudden reduction. The propriety of employing deob- struents, small doses of the blue pill, combined with ipecacuanha, active cathartics, either by the mouth or in the form of enema, and external irri- tants and revulsants, in cases of this description, cannot be questioned. Exercise, where it can be taken ; and employment for both body and mind, as far as circumstances will permit; are also most useful adjuncts. Bibliography N. Jossius, V)e Voluptate, Dolore, Fame, &c. Rom. 1580.—■ Van der Meer, Diss, de Fame Canina. Lugd. Bat. 1660.— Vesalius. Anatom., I. v.c. 3. 8. — ^onf<, Sppulchretum Anat, 1. iii. sec. ii. obs. Let 3.—Sc/iurig, Chylologia, p. 2—17.—De Reus. De Bulimo et Appetita Canino. Leid. 1673. — Mortimer, in Philos. Trans., No. 176 Kivinus, De Fame Canino, et Bulimo. Lips. 1716.—Sativagcs, Nosol. Metli. t. ii. p. 21.'>—Fretic/i, Memoirs of Med. Society of Loud., vol. i Hngstrocm, Kiilin Reportorium, h. iv.p. 630—Cullen, Synopsis, ci.— A. F. Wallher, De Obesis et Voracibus, &c. in Delect. Opuscul. Med. Col. a ./. P. Frank, p. 236. Lips. 1791.—J. M. Good, Study of. Medicine, vol. i. p. 142. — Landre- JSeauvais, art. Boulimie, Diet, des Sciences Med., tom. iii. Vitiated or Depraved Appetite. Pica, Citta, Malacia, Pseudwexia, Pica. Good. Dtjspepsia Pica, Der Sonderbare Appelil, Ger. An appetite for substances which are Spec. II. — Syn, lAmoxis Young. 1. Defi.m. not food. 2. i. Causes.— This state of the appetite some- times occurs in children, from an early accpiired liabit ; and it is frequently observed in idiots, from want of ability to discriminate what is or is not food, or from perversion of taste. Various substances also, which are abhorred in one cli- mate, constitute the chief articles of diet in another. Thus, the ('alifornians live on snakes, rats, lizards, &c., and numerous tribes of Africans on monkeys, dogs, snakes, &c. It is very fre- quently observed in pregnant, hysterical, and chlorotic females, and it is sometimes connected with certain kinds of mental emotion. 1 have met with several instances of it in females at the age of commencing puberty, when neither hy- steria, in any of its forms, nor chlorosis, existed. In these, and perhaps in the great majority of cases, it is altogether a symptomatic afTection, arising from altered sensibility of the nerves, anil modified state of the secretions of the stomach, occasioned by imperfect function, or changed condition, of a related organ, particularly of the uterus, ovaries, large bowels, and brain, 3. When it is observed as the primary disorder, it has generally been owing to a habit, commenced at first with the view of improving the shape and complexion. Females early in life sometimes have recourse to acids, particularly vinegar, and chalk, for this purpose. The form of the disease, which has been described by Dr. John Hunter as dirt-eating, by the negroes in the West Indies, and which has even assumed an epidemic cha- racter, is, perhaps, more than other forms of it, de- serving of being considered as idiopathic. The earth they devour chiefly consists of a loam or clay, and may possibly be taken by them from the circumstance of their having found it assuage the painful sensations produced in the stomach by acidity. This affection is much more frequently met with in the female than in the male sex ; but instances of its occurrence in the latter are not rare. I have seen several instances of it in males; and in females it is often practised in so concealed a way, as not to come to the knowledge of the medical attendant. 4. The substances which occasionally become the objects of desire are sufficiently numerous. Medical records abound with them. Cinders, spiders, lice, flies, insects, toads, serpents, wood, hair, paper, earth, clay, chalk, vinegar, and other acids, and even ordure, have all been devoured in cases of this disease. Various other substances have been swallowed, more as singular exploits than from actual longing for them. Thus we have accounts of persons taking into their stomachs clasp-knives, musket bullets, billiard balls, gold watches, and Louis-d'ors; and, what is still more singular, generally discharging them by stool a few days afterwards. Knife-eating seems to have been no uncommon feat, as we have instances recorded of London, Prussian, Bohemian, North American, and 13razilian knife-eaters. Our friends of the United Slates seem to have surpassed all others in the rapacity which their knife-eater exhibited; for in June, 1822 (New York Med. liepos. Oct. 1822), after having been duly initiated in the art, by swallowing a gold watch, chain and seals, billiard balls, and various other articles, at diirerent limes, which had passed through his callous digestive tube, he swallowed fourteen knives in the course of the day. This was his great, but his last exploit, for he died two months afterwards ; having passed two of the knives by stool, the remaining dozen being found in the I)ody,—eleven in the stomach, and one in the oesophagus. 5. The articles most commonly fancied by young females are paper, cotton, thread, chalk, vinegar, and other acids. I once saw a sickly-complexioned lad, who was in the habit of eating sand ; and a robust .seaman, who occasionally would devour n whole wine or ale glass, having previously crushed it in small pieces with his teeth, and yet no bad effects resulted, at least for many months after- wards ( LoHrf. Med. Uopos.jVo]. xviii.). The only other instance on record, where this most danger-](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2119709x_0118.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
