Pneumonia : its supposed connection, pathological and etiological, with autumnal fevers, including an enquiry into the existence and morbid agency of malaria / by R. La Roche.

  • La Roche, R. (René), 1795-1872.
Date:
1854
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Pneumonia : its supposed connection, pathological and etiological, with autumnal fevers, including an enquiry into the existence and morbid agency of malaria / by R. La Roche. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    of autumnal fevers—periodic and yellow, is usually connected with the prevalence of southerly winds; and on inquiry it will be found that in instances when a different result was obtained, the thermo- meter had nevertheless ranged high. Now, how do matters stand in that respect as regards pneumo- nia ? If, in some localities, as at Gibraltar, for example, the disease prevails most usually during those periods of the year when west- erly winds are predominant; if the disease also is found to occur more frequently in other places under the influence of different currents, it may be laid down as a general rule, that north, north- east, and north-west winds are those during the prevalence of which thoracic inflammations are more frequently developed. Such was found to be the case in the north of Italy and Germany by J. Frank.^ Le Pecque de la Cloture^ made similar observations in Normandy, as did also Hourmann and Dechambre,^ and Grisolle,'* at Paris. Of fifty-four cases of the disease observed by the latter author, fifteen occurred with a north-east wind; eleven with north- west; thi-ee with north wind; five with south-east; eight with south-west, and eight during a perfect calm. Hippocrates, long ago, noted the prevalence of pneumonia under the influence of north and north-east currents in Greece. But the following is the con- dition of cities which have the opposite exposure, namely, to cold winds, between the summer settings and the summer risings of the sun, and to which those winds are pecuhar, and which are sheltered from the south and the hot breezes. The diseases which prevail epidemically with them are pleurisies, and those which are called acute diseases.* Similar results have been noted in England,^ in Nova Scotia, and Bermuda; and it can scarcely be necessary to add that in this country pneumonia is almost invariably associated with the prevalence of northerly currents—N., N. E., N. W., or west. 5. Pneumonia is of yearly occurrence—not always so fevers—In connection with this subject, it may be mentioned that in places lia- Med. Repos. ii. 466; Valentin, 85-6, 89; Fev. of Baltimore in 1819, 95; Archer, Recorder, v. 61; Bailey, 55; Townsend, 55; Merrill, Phil. J. ix. 233; Barton Fev of N. 0. in 1833, p. 9. ' ^12. 2 Malad. Epid. 1st pt. 15. ' Arch. G^n. 2d s. xii. 30. 4 Qp. cil. 141. * Airs, Waters, and Places; Syd. Soc. Ed. i. 193; Littrd's Tr. ii. 19-21. • Cyclop, of Pract. Med. iii. 407.