A treatise on the epidemic puerperal fever, as it prevailed in Edinburgh in 1821-22. To which is added, as appendix, containing the essay of the late Dr. Gordon on the puerperal fever of Aberdeen in 1789-90-91-92 / By William Campbell.

  • Campbell, William, 1788-1848.
Date:
1822
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A treatise on the epidemic puerperal fever, as it prevailed in Edinburgh in 1821-22. To which is added, as appendix, containing the essay of the late Dr. Gordon on the puerperal fever of Aberdeen in 1789-90-91-92 / By William Campbell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

    64/408 (page 44)
    stated the condition of the lochial discharge to be different to that described by one or two others. Will any person of ordinary information come forward and attempt to assert, that he never saw cases of typhus, scarlatina, measles, or small-pox, but what were invariably attended with the same symptoms on every occasion ? The most complete confutation which I can ofier respecting this unchangeable condition of the uterine discharge is, that the respectable authority who supports this side of the question, recommends Hulme's cases to the world as being the most genuine and best marked, although this very author expressly states that the lochia are more or less diminished in quantity in the commencement of the disease.* I should think from this, that one or other of those gentlemen must be mistaken, I would not, however, offend the dignity of the one by telling him so ; and as to the other, nihil nisi bonwm de onortuis, so that I shall leave my readers to draw their own con- clusions. * Lochia sfepissimfe non dimlnuuntur, aliquando adsunt paucissima, aliquando totaJiter manare desinunt.—Hai-rison. The lochia or usual discharges after delivery are diminished in quantity ; it is true that at the commencement there is more or less of a suppression of the locliia ; a fresh flow of the lochia is an ehgible sign Huhne, p. 10-13-33. The lochial dischai-ge commonly contmued to flow- as usual, though in some it was diminished, yet in few or none was it wholly suppressed Gordon, p. 6. After the full developement of the disease, the lochial discharge either disappeared, or only issued in small quantity, and was veiy dai'k and uncommonly offensive Armstrong, p. 4. Now, if Drs. Gordon and Armstrong had copied from Dr. Hulme (Avho is alloxved by Professor Hamilton to have seen the disease and described it most accurately), or practised under him, it would have been impossible for their description of the lochia to bear a greater analogy to one another.