Part 33

Where the nervous system has been seriously affected, the fomentation must be gradual, and the moist heat gently insinuated into the parts affected. Where narcotics have been used, these must be given up if a cure is to be hoped for.

In certain chronic cases, which are very largely nervous in their origin, a powerful soothing influence is required. This is secured by the use of soap lather (see Lather; Soap). Cover the back and head, piece by piece, with this, rubbing it on and off four or five times. Cover the fifth application with a soft cloth, and leave it on for the day in the morning, and for the night in the evening, the patient being in bed. Hot olive oil or occasionally cold drawn oil of mustard is gently rubbed on the stiff parts; when this cloth is removed, gently knead or squeeze the oil into the muscles. If during the lathering the patient feels too cold, a little olive oil should be mixed with the lather. A change to a dry climate from a damp one sometimes does a patient good, but when that is not possible, great relief, and in many cases cure, is to be had by this treatment.

Ringworm.--This distressing and most infectious trouble is due to a small parasite. Where that settles in the skin, a reddish ring soon appears, and gradually widens, leaving a leprous white patch of skin within it. Care should be taken at once to cure this, as, if it spreads widely, serious results follow. Fortunately it is slow in growth, and can easily be checked and cured. The method of cure is to soak the rings well with vinegar or weak acetic acid. Of strong acid use three tablespoonfuls to a quart of water. By even the first good soaking with this, the developed parasites are killed, but the eggs are not. These hatch out by degrees, so that renewed soaking and "dabbing" with the acid and a soft cloth are required. Each application may be continued for fifteen minutes. If the hair, as on the head, interferes, it may be cut closely, but need not be shaved. In a bad case the daily soaking with acid may not be sufficient. Then a poultice of potatoes and buttermilk (see Buttermilk Poultice) may be applied first, and afterwards the weak acid. Secure that there be felt, before the close of each application, a slight smarting, to show that the acid has really soaked in. It is not difficult to guard against its spreading in a family or school. All that need be done is, once a week or so, to see that the whole skin of those exposed to infection, head included, is freshened by a wash all over with vinegar, and then protected with a gentle rub of olive oil. If this is done we should have little fear of contagion. Such a weekly freshening would ward off other evils as well as this one.

Rose.--See Erysipelas.

Rupture.--The abdomen is formed of a series of rings containing the bowels, and holding them in proper position. If the muscles and tissues holding these rings yield so as to permit them to separate a little, what is called "rupture" takes place. It may be caused by violent muscular efforts, heavy weight lifting, jumping from a height, etc., etc. The rings are not broken, but only displaced, and especially with young persons, the "rupture" can soon be brought all right, but even with the aged, in all cases it may be mitigated, if not cured, by proper treatment.

The first thing is to replace any part of the bowels which may have escaped through the opening of the rings. Lay the patient flat on his back. He must not be treated in any other attitude. Then rub the swelling gently downwards. It must not be rubbed upwards, or it will be made worse. This rubbing will soon bring the bowel into its proper place. Give some time and kindly care to this treatment, which is very important. Then get a surgical instrument maker to fit a proper truss. See that this really fits. If it hurts in any way when first put on, it does not fit well enough. Avoid for a considerable time any effort likely to strain the part. Take light and easily digested food; give up all alcoholic drinks and the use of tobacco.

Saliva.--See Digestion; Nourishment.

Saltrome.--The disease known by this name in Canada breaks out in the hands, especially on the palms. The skin cracks open and refuses to heal up. Sometimes, if the hands do heal, the trouble comes out on other parts. It is probably due to the long-continued use of bad and strongly irritating soap in washing the hands and face, conjoined, in Canada, with the great dryness of the air.

The treatment for prevention is the regular use of M'Clinton's soap (see Soap). Where the trouble has developed, the hands and face, if involved, should be packed in cloths soaked in buttermilk. Then over the packing we should foment with large hot flannel cloths (see Fomentation). Renew, if necessary, the buttermilk packing, and after a thorough fomenting, leave the buttermilk cloths on all night, with dry ones on top. Then gently anoint with OLIVE OIL (see). This treatment, with some rest and the use of the above-mentioned soap, should soon effect a cure.

Santolina.--This plant is the Chama Cyparissos, or ground cypress. It is of the greatest value as a remedy for worms in the bowels (not tapeworm), and also acts as a stomach tonic of no small value. It is cut at the end of the season, made up in small bunches of six stalks or so, and hung up to dry. When required for worms, boil one of these bunches in three teacupfuls of water until it is reduced to two teacupfuls. Half-a-teacupful of this is given to a child with worms, each morning before any food, for four days. In the evening of the fourth day an ordinary dose of liquorice powder is given to move the bowels. For a grown-up person the quantity is a full teacupful each morning. If a child picks at his nostrils, or grinds his teeth while sleeping, the santolina will cure him, even if no other symptom of worms is noticed. It may with advantage be used in all cases where there is indication of the failure of the mucous membrane of the stomach and bowels.

Where required as a stomach tonic, santolina should be infused with boiling water, as tea is. About half-an-ounce of the dried herb is infused, and a small teacupful taken as hot as can easily be drunk about an hour after each meal. Half the quantity will do for young people under fourteen. Do this six days in succession. Then take none for six days. Then again take it for three days. This treatment may be repeated after a week.

Sciatica.--This is a severe pain in the lower back, shooting sharply down the back and calf of the leg. It arises from inflammation of the large nerve which supplies these parts of the leg with power. Most commonly it is caused by exposure of the hips or lower back to cold and damp, as by sitting on the grass or a stone seat.

The cure for it, in the earlier stages, is the application of the ARMCHAIR FOMENTATION (see). This may be applied for an hour, and renewed immediately for another hour if the patient can stand it, and then rest given for two hours, and the fomentation applied for two hours again, or at least for one, taking care to rub with oil and wrap up in comfortable flannels between and after the treatment. This may be done again on the second day. The fomentation may then be given once a day until the pain is removed.

Be quite sure that no trifling application will succeed with such a disease as this. It will not do to use less heat than will go through and through the haunches of the patient; and that amount of heat is not very small. You must have a good soft blanket if possible, your water must be boiling hot, and you must have plenty of it.

If the hot treatment causes increase of pain, this indicates that a stage has arrived in which cold is to be applied instead of heat to the lower back, to subdue nerve irritation. Before or after this stage, cold application will do harm, so it is well always to try heat first, as in the great majority of cases that is what is required. When cold is applied, the patient must be warm, and if necessary the feet and legs should be fomented.

To keep what is got either by the soothing influence of cold or by the stimulating power of heat, it is good to rub with hot olive oil, and to dry this off well in finishing, and also to wear a good broad band of new flannel round the lower part of the body. This band ought not to be so tight as to confine the perspiration. See Changing Treatment; Remedy, Finding a.

Scrofula.--The treatment under Glands, Swollen, should be followed. But besides, the whole membranous system of the glands must be stimulated. Daily rubbing briskly over the whole body with the cold-drawn oil of mustard for a quarter-of-an-hour will have this effect, and even by itself may cure.

Good, easily digested food must be taken (see Abscess; Assimilation; Diet; Nourishment), and overwork avoided. Continued work, as with a child at school, may quite prevent a cure, while if the work ceases, the cure will be rapid. It is better to have health and holidays than sickness and school. Where there is a family tendency to scrofula, care should be taken to treat promptly any case of glandular swelling.

Scurvy.--Is a disease springing from disordered digestion, and caused sometimes by partial starvation, but more frequently by a deficiency of vegetable acid in the food. It often manifests itself in skin eruptions, the skin peeling off in scales. To ward off or cure this disease, fresh food should always be used, and salted or tinned foods avoided. Especially should abundance of green vegetables and fruit be used, and where such cannot be obtained in sufficient quantity, lemon juice is valuable. Too much exposure, fatigue, and impure air, aided by a wrong diet, are the causes that formerly made scurvy so prevalent in the navy. It has almost disappeared since a regular allowance of vegetable acid has been served out.

Seamill Sanatorium and Hydropathic.--Very soon after the appearance of these "Papers on Health," the need was felt for some establishment where the treatment expounded here could be given by trained attendants under Dr. Kirk's personal supervision. The site was fixed on the Ayrshire coast, in the parish of West Kilbride. This region was chosen because special advantages of soil, climate, and scenery recommended it. The soil along the shore is almost pure sand, and dries rapidly after rain. The climate is extremely mild, high hills sheltering the whole region from north and east winds, and the Arran mountains, intervening some sixteen miles over the sea to the west, collect much of the rain. Hence, although near some very rainy districts, the Seamill neighbourhood is peculiarly sunny and dry. In winter the sun reflected from the water, and beating on the face of the hills, makes the shore climate most genial, and when other places only a few miles away are encased in ice, flowers will be blooming in the gardens at Seamill. In the very best part of this district a villa was secured in 1880 by some gentlemen interested in the treatment, with grounds abutting on the sand of the seashore.

Here treatment was carried on with great success, until it became evident that larger premises were needed. In 1882 Mr. James Newbigging was secured by Dr. Kirk as manager and head-bathman, and worked under Dr. Kirk until the latter's death in 1886.

Mr. Newbigging then bought the establishment. Since that time, it has constantly increased in size and efficiency until it now accommodates close on a hundred patients.

Very many have come to Seamill almost or quite hopeless, and have left it with health restored and vigour renewed.

It ought to be mentioned here that in all his dealings with this establishment Dr. Kirk never had any pecuniary interest in it, always giving his services free. Nor has the writer, or any of Dr. Kirk's family, any pecuniary connection with the place. All information as to the establishment may be had by writing to the Proprietor or Manager, Seamill Sanatorium, West Kilbride, Scotland.

Sea-Sickness.--The cause of this is a nervous derangement of the internal organs, by which the bile passes into the stomach instead of, as it normally does, passing down into the intestines. A tight bandage round the middle of the body, so as to oppose resistance to this, will help so far. When the sickness has come on, a teacupful of hot water, at intervals, will very largely mitigate, and will often cure it. Even half a teacupful or a tablespoonful will prove sufficient in many cases where the teacupful cannot be taken. If this small quantity of hot water be taken every ten minutes, the worst effects of sea-sickness will not be felt, and far more relief obtained than most people will believe until they have tried it.

Sensitiveness.--When the nervous system is in a certain state, all impressions on it are exaggerated, and the patient suffers from light sounds, and various irritations, far more than is usual or healthy. This state makes treatment difficult, because either cold towel or hot flannel distresses the sufferer, and by this does more harm than good. Narcotics only do harm, without any good, and leave the patient worse.

The nervous system may in such cases be soothed by soaping the back with soap lather (see Lather; Soap). The lather is to be blood heat, and very soft and creamy. Spread it all over a soft cloth as large as the back (having first warmed the cloth), and then place it gently on the back, lather side next the skin. Let this be done at bedtime. Fasten the cloth on the back with a bodice that will fasten closely, and let the patient sleep on it. Wash off in the morning with warm vinegar and water half-and-half. Rub with oil and dry off. Let the patient take twice a-day, for eight days, a teaspoonful of well-boiled liquorice and a tablespoonful of hot water. This treatment will usually abate the sensitiveness in a week or so, and bring the patient within reach of other remedies. For example, it will, after a week or so, even in very trying cases, be possible to foment the feet and legs once a day, and rub them with warm olive oil. It will even be possible and well to foment with a hot blanket across the haunches, and in this way to bring on comparatively strong health. Change of air and scene will then be desirable: it is highly refreshing to one who is in the way of recovering, though only harassing to one who is feeling despondent and increasingly ill. We generally, when asked if a "change" would not be good in such cases, reply, "Yes, if once you have got health enough to enjoy it." When that has been fairly secured, stronger measures may be used with advantage. We feel much sympathy with those who suffer from sensitiveness, as so many do, and earnestly pray that these remarks may be blessed to such sufferers.

Shampooing.--See Head, Soaping.