Phthisis; its morbid anatomy, etiology, symptomatic events and complications, fatality and prognosis, treatment and physical diagnosis : in a series of clinical studies.

  • Flint, Austin, 1812-1886.
Date:
1875
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Phthisis; its morbid anatomy, etiology, symptomatic events and complications, fatality and prognosis, treatment and physical diagnosis : in a series of clinical studies. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

    21/492 (page 17)
    PHTHISIS: SERIES OF CLINICAL STUDIES. INTRODUCTION. The purpose, in the pages which are to follow, is to give the results of clinical studies relating to phthisis. Notwithstanding the pathological distinctions, the nosological subdivisions, and the variety of names which are to be found in recent medical literature, the terms phthisis, pneumonic phthisis, and pulmo- nary consumption, apply to a well-defined class of cases. In a clinical or practical view, the application of these terms occa- sions no difficulty nor confusion. Applied without any qualifi- cation, they denote a chronic affection. For the most part, the cases which I am about to study are cases of chronic disease. . I shall, however, embrace in my studies some cases of the affection known as acute miliary tuberculosis, and, also, some cases of the form of chronic disease called fibroid phthisis, or cirrhosis of the lung. With these few exceptions, all the cases belong to a class remarkable for uniformity as regards the character of lesions, together with the symptomatic events and laws which belong to the clinical history. With the disease in its ordinary form, all physicians, from its frequency, are but too familiar. Of the cases of phthisis which had come under my observation up to the time of entering on these studies, I have preserved notes of a considerable number, namely, six hundred and seventy. These cases were noted during a period of thirty-four years. For twenty-five years I made notes of nearly all the cases which I observed, both in private and in hospital practice; but for the past nine years my field of clinical observation has been so large, and my professional duties have been so much increased, that the