Mother's Remedies Part 10

3. Pneumonia, Hot Vinegar Applications for.--Congestion of Lungs.--"Over the lungs lay cloths wet in clear hot vinegar. They should be five or six inches square and several thicknesses. Over the cloths lay a hot plate or hot water bottle; change as often as necessary to keep them hot. This treatment will soon give relief, after which rub as much oil into the lungs as possible."

PHYSICIANS' TREATMENT for Pneumonia.--A doctor must be called. For high fever, one to one and a half drops of aconite, for adults every hour; for children, about one-twelfth to one-eighth of a drop. For cough, chloride of ammonium, one to two grain doses. For pain, hot applications.

Diet.--Milk, broth and egg alb.u.men and plenty of water to drink. (See laryngitis for diet.)

ACUTE PLEURISY (Inflammation of the Pleura).--The pleura covers the wall of the chest cavity and infolds or surrounds the lungs. Pleurisy means the inflammation of this pleura or covering.

[42 MOTHERS' REMEDIES]

Causes.--Exposure to cold, etc. Onset may be gradual or sudden, with chills fever and sharp st.i.tches in the side near the arm pit or breast.

The patient lies on the affected side during the attack, the pain is made worse by breathing, coughing or motion. The cough is dry and painful, with difficult breathing. The temperature 102 to 103. Sometimes there is fluid acc.u.mulated in the cavity. In about seven to ten days the fever and other symptoms disappear. The fluid is absorbed quickly if it is scanty, often very slowly if abundant. This fluid is contained in the cavity of the pleura. The pleura covers the lungs. Its outer layer is attached to the ribs and costal cartilages in front and ribs behind, goes around the foot of the lungs underneath, then turns around under the side of the lungs and comes in front, making a sac. The two layers in health touch each other, but are separated when there is fluid in the cavity. The inner layer covers the lungs and drops into the grooves of the lungs. You can thus readily understand how easy it is for the pleura to be attacked. Also when the lung is inflamed we have what we call pleura-pneumonia. Pleurisy is a very painful disease. It hurts to move, breathe, or cough. The patient holds his chest when he coughs. The fluid that forms is poured out from the inflamed membrane, sometimes it is so great in quant.i.ty it must be drawn off,--tapped; we then call this hydrothorax,--water in the chest.

Diet and Nursing--The patient should be kept quiet and in the easiest position.

Milk diet is the best to use. There should not be much liquid diet, except milk. The milk may be diluted with lime water if necessary. Malted milk, Mellin's food, imperial granum, can be used when the milk cannot be taken.

PHYSICIANS' TREATMENT for Pleurisy.--1. Home Remedy.--The patient must go to bed and remain there. It is a good thing to get the patient in a sweat.

For this purpose you can use the corn sweat described under treatment of la grippe. This will ease the patient and may shorten the attack.

I have great faith in this remedy in most inflammatory diseases. I had a patient sick with pleurisy; she did not get along fast enough to suit me, her color was a yellow-green. I advised the corn sweat and she improved fast from that time. Her night dress was green in color after the sweat. I have saved pneumonia cases in the same way. Of course, some cases may be too weak to stand it.

[RESPIRATORY DISEASES 43]

2. Other Home Remedies.--Another way to produce sweating is by placing fruit cans filled with hot water about the patient. This will stop the chilly cold feeling and also will relieve the pain. If you have a rubber water bottle, put hot water in that and place it near the sorest spot. It may hurt the patient by its weight; if so, use less water, at the same time you can give hot drinks freely. Almost any kind will do. If the stomach feels bad, ginger or peppermint is best. h.o.a.rhound tea is especially good for chest trouble.

3. Fomentations.--Of hops or wormwood or smartweed, or catnip applied frequently and hot to the affected side often bring relief. They must always be hot, and you must be careful not to get the night robes or covers wet.

4. Camphorated Oil for.--Rub the side with camphorated oil and cover over with a cotton jacket. This is good unless it makes the patient too warm.

5. Adhesive Plaster Zinc Oxide.--Use a roll two or two and one-half inches wide. Commence at the backbone and cross directly over the ribs to the further side of the breastbone. The first strip should be at the lower part of the chest. In putting on the succeeding strips make them lap one-half inch over the next lower. Bandage almost up to the arm-pit. It may take eight strips for an adult. After you have the strips on, place a piece at each end, part on the flesh and part on the plasters, to keep them from giving any. The patient should have his arms over his head when you are putting on the strips. This strapping will hold that side of the chest quieter. The breathing will be less full and consequently less motion and pain.

6. Tincture of aconite in doses of one-tenth to one drop can be given everyone to three hours at the beginning, if there is much fever, dry hot skin, and full bounding pulse. Dover's powder can be given at night.

7. A hypodermic of morphine is frequently given when the pain is intense.

ABSCESS OF THE LUNGS. Causes.--Lobular pneumonia from abscesses in pyemia, from septic pleurisy, etc.

Symptoms.--Fever, pain, difficult breathing, cough, and expectoration containing or consisting of pus of offensive odor, etc.

PHYSICIANS' TREATMENT of Abscess of the Lungs.--Incision and drainage. You must depend entirely upon your physician.

EMPHYSEMA.--A condition in which there is air or gas in tissues that normally have none, or an excess of air in tissues that normally contain a certain quant.i.ty of it. A condition of the lungs characterized by a permanent dilation of the air cells of the lung with dwindling of the air cell walls and the blood vessels, resulting in a loss of the normal elasticity of the lung tissue.

Causes.--Heredity; it occurs in gla.s.s blowers, in musicians using wind instruments. It occurs also after whooping-cough, asthma, etc.

HYDROTHORAX.--This is an exudation (liquid) in the pleural cavity.

Causes.--Comes from disease causing dropsy, kidney disease, lung trouble, pleurisy, etc.

[44 MOTHERS' REMEDIES]

PHYSICIANS' TREATMENT.--Treat disease that causes it. An operation to remove the fluid may be necessary. A trusted physician must advise you.

NIGHT SWEATS.--These are common in "consumption" and const.i.tute one of the most distressing features of the disease. They usually occur when the fever drops in the early morning hours, or at any time of the day when the patient is sleeping. They may come on early in the disease, but are more persistent and frequent after cavities have formed in the lungs; some of the patients escape it altogether.

MOTHERS' REMEDIES.-l. Night Sweats, Salt Bath for.--"Bathe the body in salt water every other day. Just before retiring take a cup of sage tea, and eat nourishing food," The salt acts as an astringent as it slightly closes up the pores, and the sage establishes a better circulation and at the same time helps the sweating. This is a very simple and effective remedy.

2. Night Sweats, Cold Sage for.--"Drink cold sage tea, before retiring."

This cold sage tea is only to be used when the patient has a fever and needs a cold drink. In case of this kind it would be effective.

PHYSICIAN'S TREATMENT for Night Sweats.--l. Atropine in doses of 1-120 to 1-60 grain is good to stop the sweating. It must be used carefully, three doses in twenty-four hours are enough.

2. Tonics to keep up the appet.i.te like gentian, nux vomica or quinine may be given. The patient should wear flannel night-dresses, as the cotton night-shirt, when soaked with perspiration, has a cold, clammy feeling.

Bathe the patient in the morning with tepid water and afterwards rub gently with alcohol diluted one-half with water. Night sweating occurs in rickets but mainly around the head. They also occur when one is run down, but they are not so debilitating and constant. In such cases, building up treatment is needed. Proper diet, bathing, out-door life, bitter tonics, etc.

[ANIMAL PARASITES 45]

ANIMAL PARASITES, DISEASES CAUSED BY.

ROUND WORM.--(Ascariasis Lumbricoides).--The round worm resembles the angle worm in form; is the most common human parasite and is found chiefly in children. The female is seven to twelve inches long, the male four to eight inches. It is pointed at both ends. The parasite occupies the upper part of the small bowel and there is usually only one or two present, but sometimes they occur in enormous numbers. They migrate in a peculiar manner. They may pa.s.s into the stomach, whence they may be thrown out by vomiting, or they may crawl up the gullet, and enter the pharynx and cause serious trouble. They may go up the eustachian tube and appear at the external meatus (opening of ear). The serious migration is into the bile-duct. There is a specimen in the Wister-Horner Museum of the University of Pennsylvania in which not only the common bile-duct, but also the main branches throughout the liver, are enormously distended, and packed with numerous round worms. The bowel may be blocked or in rare instances an ulcer may be perforated; even the healthy bowel may be perforated.

Symptoms.--Picking of the nose, grinding of the teeth, a whitish paleness around the mouth, restless sleep; sometimes convulsions, or presence of worms in the stool. Bad health, cross, peevish, irritable and dumpy, when the child is naturally the opposite.

MOTHERS' REMEDIES.--l. Round or Pin Worms, Sage Tea for.--"Sage tea is a fine remedy for children troubled with worms, taken before breakfast or on going to bed." Sage tea may help; I have known other mothers to have faith in it. Its virtue may consist in being a laxative and an antiseptic which in themselves would add to the general health of the child.

2. Round and Pin Worms, Tansy remedy for.--"Tansy leaves may be crushed and put in whisky or dried and crushed with sugar. This is the best vermifuge I ever used." A tea made of tansy leaves must be used carefully as it is strong and never given to pregnant women.

3. Round and Pin Worms, Peach Leaf Tea for.--"Half an ounce of dried peach leaves may be infused in a pint of boiling water and a tablespoonful given for a dose three times a day." They are laxative and exert a sedative influence over the nervous system. They have been frequently used for worms with reported success. An infusion is highly recommended in irritability of the bladder, in sick stomach and in whooping cough.

PHYSICIANS' TREATMENT.--l. Dr. Osler, of Oxford, England, recommends as follows: Santonin in doses of two or three grains for an adult; one or two a day for three or four days, followed by salts or calomel; one-half to one grain for children in the same way. This seems to me to be unnecessarily large.

[46 MOTHERS' REMEDIES]

2. Dr. Ritter's Santonin Remedy.--

I always give it thus: Santonin 1/10 grain Calomel 1/10 grain

Give four a day for two days, then miss two days, then give again for two days and stop. Salts can be given after this. I then follow this treatment by giving one drop doses of tincture of cina (Homeopathic preparation) four times a day for one or two weeks. Before giving any of these remedies it is well to move the bowels freely and also after the medicine has been stopped.

3. Dr. Dougla.s.s of Detroit, Michigan, recommends the following for a child five to ten years old:

Santonin 12 grains Calomel 3 grains

Divide into six powders, and give one night and morning while fasting.