Fever nursing : designed for the use of professional and other nurses, and especially as a text-book for nurses in training / by J.C. Wilson.

Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Fever nursing : designed for the use of professional and other nurses, and especially as a text-book for nurses in training / by J.C. Wilson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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

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    The spaces corresponding to a degree of the Fahren- heit scale are divided into fifths. The temperature as observed is designated by a dot in the appropriate position. These dots joined by ruled lines form a zigzag line, called the temperature curve. It is usual to form the general curve of the case by means of the regular morning and evening temperatures, and to indicate the result of observations made at other hours by dots in the appropriate positions, with figures and letters showing the hour at which they were made; thus, 12 noon, 3.30 p.m., or 4-15 a.m. If the fever be prolonged beyond three weeks, two or more charts may be pasted together. These charts thus kept are not only of value for preservation. They are also of immediate use as showing at a glance and with precision the facts of the case at every period from its coming under observation, the course it is running by a comparison of the symp- toms day by day, and in a general way the eifects of treatment, the changes of which are fully presented. Those only who have used them can understand their value. Especially are they valuable in fevers in enabling us to watch the course of the temperature, which is part of the natural history of the disease and conforms to a type not only in its daily fluctuations but also in its duration. The attack of fever may begin suddenly, as in pneu- monia, in which the temperature often rises rapidly and continuously to 104° F., or more. Such diseases are apt to begin with a more or less violent rigor or