Zoonomia Volume Ii Part 31

It may thus frequently happen, that in the humoral asthma some exertions of the lungs may occur, which may not contribute to discharge the anasarcous lymph, but may be efforts simply to relieve pain; besides those efforts, which produce the increased absorption and elimination of it; and thus we have a bodily disease resembling in this circ.u.mstance the reverie, in which both sensitive and voluntary motions are at the same time, or in succession, excited for the purpose of relieving pain.

It may likewise sometimes happen, that the disagreeable sensation, occasioned by the congestion of lymph in the air-cells in the humoral or hydropic asthma, may induce voluntary convulsions of the respiratory organs only to relieve the pain, without any sensitive actions of the pulmonary absorbents to absorb and eliminate the congestion of serous fluid; and thus the same cause may occasionally induce either the humoral or convulsive asthma.

The humoral asthma has but one remote cause, which is the torpor of the pulmonary vessels, like that which occurs on going into the cold bath; or the want of absorption of the pulmonary lymphatics to take up the lymph effused into the air-cell. Whereas the convulsive asthma, like other convulsions, or epilepsies, may be occasioned by pain in almost any remote part of the system. But in some of the adult patients in this disease, as in many epilepsies, I have suspected the remote cause to be a pain of the liver, or of the biliary ducts.

The asthmas, which have been induced in consequence of the recess of eruptions, especially of the leprous kind, countenance this opinion. One lady I knew, who for many years laboured under an asthma, which ceased on her being afflicted with pain, swelling, and distortion of some of her large joints, which were esteemed gouty, but perhaps erroneously. And a young man, whom I saw yesterday, was seized with asthma on the retrocession, or ceasing of eruptions on his face.

The convulsive asthma, as well as the hydropic, are more liable to return in hot weather; which may be occasioned by the less quant.i.ty of oxygen existing in a given quant.i.ty of warm air, than of cold, which can be taken into the lungs at one inspiration. They are both most liable to occur after the first sleep, which is therefore a general criterion of asthma. The cause of this is explained in Sect. XVIII. 15. and applies to both of them, as our sensibility to internal uneasy sensation increases during sleep.

When children are gaining teeth, long before they appear, the pain of the gums often induces convulsions. This pain is relieved in some by sobbing and screaming; but in others a laborious respiration is exerted to relieve the pain; and this const.i.tutes the true asthma convulsivum. In other children again general convulsions, or epileptic paroxysms, are induced for this purpose; which, like other epilepsies, become established by habit, and recur before the irritation has time to produce the painful sensation, which originally caused them.

The asthma convulsivum is also sometimes induced by worms, or by acidity in the stomachs of children, and by other painful sensations in adults; in whom it is generally called nervous asthma, and is often joined with other epileptic symptoms.

This asthma is distinguished from the peripneumony, and from the croup, by the presence of fever in the two latter. It is distinguished from the humoral asthma, as in that the patients are more liable to run to the cold air for relief, are more subject to cold extremities, and experience the returns of it more frequently after their first sleep. It is distinguished from the hydrops thoracis, as that has no intervals, and the patient sits constantly upright, and the breath is colder; and, where the pericardium is affected, the pulse is quick and unequal. See Hydrops Thoracis, I. 2. 3.

14.

M. M. Venesection once. A cathartic with calomel once. Opium. a.s.safoetida.

Warm bath. If the cause can be detected, as in toothing or worms, it should be removed. As this species of asthma is so liable to recur during sleep, like epileptic fits, as mentioned in Section XVIII. 15. there was reason to believe, that the respiration of an atmosphere mixed with hydrogen, or any other innocuous air, which might dilute the oxygen, would be useful in preventing the paroxysms by decreasing the sensibility of the system. This, I am informed by Dr. Beddoes, has been used with decided success by Dr.

Ferriar. See Cla.s.s II. 1. 1. 7.

11. _Asthma dolorific.u.m._ Angina pectoris. The painful asthma was first described by Dr. Heberden in the Transactions of the College; its princ.i.p.al symptoms consist in a pain about the middle of the sternum, or rather lower, on every increase of pulmonary or muscular exertion, as in walking faster than usual, or going quick up a hill, or even up stairs; with great difficulty of breathing, so as to occasion the patient instantly to stop. A pain in the arms about the insertion of the tendon of the pectoral muscle generally attends, and a desire of resting by hanging on a door or branch of a tree by the arms is sometimes observed. Which is explained in Cla.s.s I.

2. 3. 14. and in Sect. XXIX. 5. 2.

These patients generally die suddenly; and on examining the thorax no certain cause, or seat, of the disease has been detected; some have supposed the valves of the arteries, or of the heart, were imperfect; and others that the acc.u.mulation of fat about this viscus or the lungs obstructed their due action; but other observations do not accord with these suppositions.

Mr. W----, an elderly gentleman, was seized with asthma during the hot part of last summer; he always waked from his first sleep with difficult respiration, and pain in the middle of his sternum, and after about an hour was enabled to sleep again. As this had returned for about a fortnight, it appeared to me to be an asthma complicated with the disease, which Dr.

Heberden has called angina pectoris. It was treated by venesection, a cathartic, and then by a grain of opium given at going to bed, with ether and tincture of opium when the pain or asthma required, and lastly with the bark, but was several days before it was perfectly subdued.

This led me to conceive, that in this painful asthma the diaphragm, as well as the other muscles of respiration, was thrown into convulsive action, and that the fibres of this muscle not having proper antagonists, a painful fixed spasm of it, like that of the muscles in the calf of the leg in the cramp, might be the cause of death in the angina pectoris, which I have thence arranged under the name of painful asthma, and leave for further investigation.

From the history of the case of the late much lamented John Hunter, and from the appearances after death, the case seems to have been of this kind, complicated with vertigo and consequent affection of the stomach. The remote cause seems to have arisen from ossifications of the coronary arteries; and the immediate cause of his death from fixed spasm of the heart. Other histories and dissections are still required to put this matter out of doubt; as it is possible, that either a fixed spasm of the diaphragm, or of the heart, which are both furnished with but weak antagonists, may occasion sudden death; and these may const.i.tute two distinct diseases.

Four patients I have now in my recollection, all of whom I believed to labour under the angina pectoris in a great degree; which have all recovered, and have continued well three or four years by the use, as I believe, of issues on the inside of each thigh; which were at first large enough to contain two pease each, and afterwards but one. They took besides some slight antimonial medicine for a while, and were reduced to half the quant.i.ty or strength of their usual potation of fermented liquor.

The use of femoral issues in angina pectoris was first recommended by Dr.

Macbride, physician at Dublin, Med. Observ. & Enquir. Vol. VI. And I was further induced to make trial of them, not only because the means which I had before used were inadequate, but from the ill effect I once observed upon the lungs, which succeeded the cure of a small sore beneath the knee; and argued conversely, that issues in the lower limbs might a.s.sist a difficult respiration.

Mrs. L----, about fifty, had a small sore place about the size of half a pea on the inside of the leg a little below the knee. It had discharged a pellucid fluid, which she called a ley-water, daily for fourteen years, with a great deal of pain; on which account she applied to a surgeon, who, by means of bandage and a saturnine application, soon healed the sore, unheedful of the consequences. In less than two months after this I saw her with great difficulty of breathing, which with universal anasarca soon destroyed her.

The theory of the double effect of issues, as above related, one in relieving by their presence the asthma dolorific.u.m, and the other in producing by its cure an anasarca of the lungs, is not easy to explain.

Some similar effects from cutaneous eruptions and from blisters are mentioned in Cla.s.s I. 1. 2. 9. In these cases it seems probable, that the pain occasioned by issues, and perhaps the absorption of a small quant.i.ty of aerated purulent matter, stimulate the whole system into greater energy of action, and thus prevent the torpor which is the beginning of so many diseases. In confirmation of this effect of pain on the system, I remember the case of a lady of an ingenious and active mind, who, for many of the latter years of her life, was perpetually subject to great pains of her head from decaying teeth. When all her teeth were gone, she became quite low spirited, and melancholy in the popular sense of that word, and after a year or two became universally dropsical and died.

M. M. Issues in the thighs. Five grains of rhubarb, and one sixth of a grain of emetic tartar every night for some months, with or without half a grain of opium. No stronger liquor than small beer, or wine diluted with twice its quant.i.ty of water. Since I wrote the above I have seen two cases of hydrops thoracis, attended with pain in the left arm, so as to be mistaken for asthma dolorific.u.m, in which femoral issues, though applied early in the disease, had no effect.

12. _Stridor dentium._ The clattering of the teeth on going into cold water, or in the beginning of ague-fits, is an exertion along with the tremblings of the skin to relieve the pain of cold. The teeth and skin being more sensible to cold than the more internal parts, and more exposed to it, is the reason that the muscles, which serve them, are thrown into exertion from the pain of cold rather than those of respiration, as in screaming from more acute pain. Thus the poet,

Put but your toes into cold water, Your correspondent teeth will clatter.

PRIOR.

In more acute pains the jaws are gnashed together with great vehemence, insomuch that sometimes the teeth are said to have been broken by the force. See Sect. x.x.xIV. 1. 3. In these cases something should be offered to the patient to bite, as a towel, otherwise they are liable to tear their own arms, or to bite their attendants, as I have witnessed in the painful epilepsy.

13. _Teta.n.u.s trismus._ Cramp. The teta.n.u.s consists of a fixed spasm of almost all the muscles of the body; but the trismus, or locked jaw, is the most frequent disease of this kind. It is generally believed to arise from sympathy with an injured tendon. In one case where it occurred in consequence of a broken ankle from a fall from a horse, it was preceded by evident hydrophobia. Amputation was advised, but not submitted to; two wounds were laid into one with scissors, but the patient died about the seventh day from the accident. In this case the wounded tendon, like the wounds from the bite of a mad dog, did not produce the hydrophobia, and then the locked jaw, till several days after the accident.

I twice witnessed the locked jaw from a pain beneath the sternum, about the part where it is complained of in painful asthma, or angina pectoris, in the same lady at some years distance of time. The last time it had continued two days, and she wrote her mind, or expressed herself by signs.

On observing a broken tooth, which made a small aperture into her mouth, I rolled up five grains of opium like a worm about an inch long, and introducing it over the broken tooth, pushed it onward by means of a small crow-quill; as it dissolved I observed she swallowed her saliva, and in less than half an hour, she opened her mouth and conversed as usual.

Men are taught to be ashamed of screaming from pain in their early years; hence they are p.r.o.ne to exert the muscles of the jaws instead, which they have learnt to exert frequently and violently from their infancy; whence the locked jaw. This and the following spasm have no alternate relaxations, like the preceding ones; which is perhaps owing, first, to the weakness of their antagonist muscles, those which elevate the jaw being very strong for the purpose of biting and masticating hard substances, and for supporting the under jaw, with very weak antagonist muscles; and secondly, to their not giving sufficient relief even for a moment to the pain, or its preceding irritation, which excited them.

M. M. Opium in very large quant.i.ties. Mercurial ointment used extensively.

Electricity. Cold bath. Dilate the wound, and fill it with lint moistened with spirit of turpentine; which inflames the wound, and cures or prevents the convulsions. See a case, Transact. of American Society, Vol. II. p.

227.

Wine in large quant.i.ties in one case was more successful than opium; it probably inflames more, which in this disease is desirable. Between two or three ounces of bark, and from a quart to three pints of wine a day, succeeded better than opium. Ib.

14. _Teta.n.u.s dolorificus._ Painful cramp. This kind of spasm most frequently attacks the calf of the leg, or muscles of the toes; it often precedes paroxysms of gout, and appears towards the end of violent diarrhoea, and from indigestion, or from acid diet. In these cases it seems to sympathize with the bowels, but is also frequently produced by the pain of external cold, and to the too great previous extension of the muscles, whence some people get the cramp in the extensor muscles of the toes after walking down hill, and of those of the calf of the leg after walking up a steep eminence. For the reason why these cramps commence in sleep, see Sect. XVIII. 15.

The muscle in this disease contracts itself to relieve some smaller pain, either from irritation or a.s.sociation, and then falls into great pain itself, from the too great action of its own fibres. Hence any muscle, by being too vehemently exerted, falls into cramp, as in swimming too forcibly in water, which is painfully cold; and a secondary pain is then induced by the too violent contraction of the muscle; though the pain, which was the cause of the contraction, ceases. Which accounts for the continuance of the contraction, and distinguishes this disease from other convulsions, which are relaxed and exerted alternately. Hence whatever may be the cause of the primary pain, which occasions the cramp of the calf of the leg, the secondary one is relievable by standing up, and thus by the weight of the body on the toes forcibly extending the contracted muscles. For the cause, which induces these muscles of the calf of the leg to fall into more violent contraction than other spasmodic muscles, proceeds from the weakness of their antagonist muscles; as they are generally extended again after action by the weight of the body on the b.a.l.l.s of the toes. See the preceding article.

M. M. Rub the legs with camphor dissolved in oil, and let the patient wear stockings in bed. If a foot-board be put at the bed's feet, and the bed be so inclined, that he will rest a little with his toes against the foot-board, that pressure is said to prevent the undue contractions of the musculi gastrocnemii, which const.i.tute the calf of the leg. In gouty patients, or where the bowels are affected with acidity, half a grain of opium, and six grains of rhubarb, and six of chalk, every night. Flesh-meat to supper. A little very weak warm spirit and water may be taken for present relief, when these cramps are very troublesome to weak or gouty patients.

15. _Hydrophobia._ Dread of water generally attending canine madness. I was witness to a case, where this disease preceded the locked jaw from a wound in the ankle, occasioned by a fall from a horse; as mentioned in the preceding article. It came on about the sixth day after the accident; when the patient attempted to swallow fluids, he became convulsed all over from the pain of this attempt, and spurted them out of his mouth with violence.

It is also said to happen in some hysterical cases. Hence it seems rather the immediate consequence of a pained tendon, than of a contagious poison.

And is so far a.n.a.logous to teta.n.u.s, according with the opinions of Doctor Rusch and Doctor Percival.

In other respects, as it is produced by the saliva of an enraged animal instilled into a wound, it would seem a.n.a.logous to the poison of venomous animals. And from the manner of its access so long after the bite, and of its termination in a short time, it would seem to resemble the progress of contagious fevers. See Sect. XXII. 3. 3.

If the patient was bitten in a part, which could be totally cut away, as a finger, even after the hydrophobia appears, it is probable it might cure it; as I suspect the cause still remains in the wounded tendon, and not in a diffused infection tainting the blood. Hence there are generally uneasy sensations, as cold or numbness, in the old cicatrix, before the hydrophobia commences. See a case in Medical Communications, Vol. II. p.

190.

If the diseased tendon could be inflamed without cutting it out, as by cupping, or caustic, or blister after cupping, and this in the old wound long since healed, after the hydrophobia commences, might prevent the spasms about the throat. As inflaming the teeth by the use of mercury is of use in some kinds of hemicrania. Put spirit of turpentine on the wound, wash it well. See Cla.s.s I. 3. 1. 11. IV. 1. 2. 7.

M. M. Wine, musk, oil, internally. Opium, mercurial ointment, used extensively. Mercurial fumigation. Turpeth mineral. To salivate the patient as soon as possible. Exsection or a caustic on the scar, even after the appearance of hydrophobia. Put a tight bandage on the limb above the scar of the old wound to benumb the pained tendon, however long the wound may have been healed. Could a hollow catheter of elastic gum, caoutchouc, be introduced into the oesophagus by the mouth or nostril, and liquid nourishment be thus conveyed into the stomach? See Desault's Journal, Case I. where, in an ulcer of the mouth, such a catheter was introduced by the nostril, and kept in the oesophagus for a month, by which means the patient was nourished and preserved.

It is recommended by Dr. Bardsley to give oil internally by a similar method contrived by Mr. John Hunter. He covered a probang with the skin of a small eel, or the gut of a lamb or cat. It was tied up at one end above and below the sponge, and a slit made above the upper ligature; to the other end of the eel-skin or gut was fixed a bladder and pipe. The probang thus covered was introduced into the stomach, and the liquid food or medicine was put into the bladder and squeezed down through the eel-skin.

Mem. of Society at Manchester. See Cla.s.s I. 2. 3. 25.

Dr. Bardsley has endeavoured to prove, that dogs never experience the hydrophobia, or canine madness, without having been previously bitten or infected; and secondly, that the disease in this species of animal always shews itself in five or six weeks; and concludes from hence, that this dreadful malady might be annihilated by making all the dogs in Great Britain perform a kind of quarantine, by shutting them up for a certain number of weeks. Though the disease from the bite of the mad dog is perhaps more a.n.a.logous to those from the wounds inflicted by venomous animals than to those from other contagious matter, yet these observations are well worthy further attention; which the author promises.

ORDO I.

_Increased Volition._

GENUS II.

_With increased Actions of the Organs of Sense._