Non nocere / by A. Jacobi.

  • Jacobi, A.
Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Non nocere / by A. Jacobi. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    cardial changes, heart failure, and death, or to mental disturbance, which were not actively treated in time by absolute rest, reduction of heat, and moderate or vigor- ous early stimulation ; the pneumonia which, when de- lirium, cyanosis, and dilatation of the right heart became urgent dangers, was not relieved by a venesection ; the protracted and hesitating convalescence, with its anaemia and flagging pulse, which was not supported by heart tonics, not “ pro re nata,” for res was “ nata ” already, before it was too late forever, are, and must be for life, loads on the practitioner’s conscience. Sophocles says (Aias 581) : ov irpbs larpov crcxpov Spr\vtiv eirwbas irpbs ro/ucvyri irt]p.ari. “ No bright physician mourns plaintively over a case where he ought at once to use the knife.” Decision must not be difficult, in spite of Hippocrates (17 KpiW xa^€7rv)i for 6 Katpos o£v$, the favorable time is fleeting. Nor hover over official ‘ ‘ maximum doses ’ ’ in cases where one of the scales contains your anxiety for your own personal safety and lawful righteousness, and the life of a human being is held in the other. Indeed the maximum doses of the Pharmacopoeias often appear to be established for the still less than average person who fears more for himself than for his patient. Parallel to over- and under-dosing, run over- and under- feeding. The latter requires no discussion here, the for- mer I shall refer to only in connection with small infants, for the subject could not be exhausted in ten lectures. They require much food because they have not only to reproduce but to grow. When they take beyond need, one of two things must occur; for no surplus can pass the alimentary tract any length of time without evil re- sults. Either a surplus material is gradually accumulated in the organs and will lead to disease, or no complete digestion takes place, and then all forms of gastritis, en- teritis, or auto-infection will develop. I shall only dwell