Home › Medicine › Treatment (Apply pressure blisters)

Treatment (Apply pressure blisters)

Apply pressure, blisters or frictions of strong camphorated mercurial ointment to the tumor. If these are of no avail, make a small puncture in it with the point of a sharp lancet, let out its contents and apply pressure to the part, so as to make the two sides of the sack or bag grow together.

Boils.

Symptoms. A hard, circumscribed, inflamed and very painful tumor, of a conical shape, seldom exceeding in size a pigeon's egg.

Treatment. If the patient is of a full habit, bleed and purge him with Epsom salts. A soft poultice of warm bread and milk, or rye or flaxseed meal, should always be applied to the boil, and frequently changed. If the pain is excessive, a teaspoonful of laudanum may be mixed with each one. In a few days matter will be formed, when it may be let out with a sharp lancet.

Carbuncle.

A deeply seated, hard, immovable and circumscribed tumor, which appears generally on the back, shoulders, etc. About the middle it is of a dark red or purple color, being much paler or mottled round its edges. It is attended with an intolerable itching and burning pain, and at last becomes a kind of sloughing ulcer.

Treatment. This will depend upon the state of the constitution. Most generally there is great weakness, in which case the diet must be generous. Bark, with the elixir of vitriol and opium, to relieve the pain, are to be frequently employed.

As a local remedy, a blister ranks very high. It should be placed directly on the part. After being cut, it may be succeeded by a basilicon plas. ter. A modern writer strongly recommends the solution of arsenic as a local remedy in this disease. Pledgets of linen dipped in the liquor, are to be laid on the swelling and frequently renewed.

When matter begins to form, apply a bread and milk poultice, and treat it in every respect as a common ulcer. Surgeons mostly advise the early use of deep incisions of carbuncle entirely across it, in two directions, at right angles to each other. Whitlow, or Felon.

Symptoms. An inflamed tumor at the end of the finger. It is of three kinds. The first is situated immediately under the skin, around the nail; the second in the cellular membrane, the pain and swelling of which is much greater than in the first, and the matter much longer in forming; the third lies under the sheath or covering of the tendons of the fingers, and is infinitely more violent, painful and dangerous than either of the others.

Treatment. If of the first description, open the little abscess with a needle and let out the matter, which should be prevented from forming, if possible, by bathing the part with camphorated spirits. The second should be dispersed by purging, and by leeches and blisters. If the inflammation is not reduced by these means, with a very sharp penknife make an early and free incision in the middle of the last joint of the finger down to the bone. Suffer the blood to run for a few minutes, and then treat it as a common cut. The same practice should be followed with regard to the third.

Piles.

Symptoms. A pain in the fundament when going to stool; on examination small tumors are perceived to project beyond its verge, They are of two kinds-the blind and bleeding. They may also be internal and external.

Blind Piles.

Treatment. A diet of rye mush and milk, strictly adhered to for a length of time, will very frequently cure the disease. If they project, are swelled and painful, apply twenty or thirty leeches to them, and cold applications. The common gall ointment is a very soothing application. Balsam copaiva in doses sufficiently large to purge freely is also highly recommended. A radical cure, however, is only to be sought for in the knife or ligature, for which apply to a surgeon.

If the pain is very great, laudanum may be taken to ease it.

Bleeding Piles.

Treatment. If the bleeding is considerable, inject a solution of alum or a decoction of oak bark, or make pressure upon the vessels by introducing a sheep's gut, tied at one end, into the fundament, and then filling it with any astringent fluid by a clyster pipe. This evacuation is sometimes salutary, and it often requires much judgment to know if it should be stopped or not.

Of Abscess.

Symptoms. The formation of matter under the skin, or in any part of the body, preceded by inflammation, and marked by a dull, heavy weight; by the pain becoming more acute and darting; by a peculiar throbbing; by the swelling becoming more elevated and soft to the touch. If the tumor is not opened it bursts. Treatment. Apply a soft and warm bread and milk or linseed poultice to the part, and endeavor to hasten the formation of matter. When this is evident, let it out with a sharp lancet. If the vatient is weak, let him have a generous diet, with wine, porter, bark, etc.

Psoas Abscess.

Symptoms. A weakness across the loins, accompanied by a dull pain. After a while the pain shifts from the back to the thigh and hip, becoming more darting and severe. The glands in the groin swell, and at last a soft tumor is perceived at the lower edge of the groin, or by the side of the fundament; the swelling increases to a large size, and sometimes extends itself down the thigh.

Treatment. In the early stage purge the patient; keep him on a low diet and apply a large blister over the lower part of the back. Confinement in bed is absolutely necessary. When matter is formed make an opening into the tumor in the following manner: Push a sharp lancet first through the skin, then obliquely upwards under it, and then, by depressing the point, pierce the swelling itself. In this way the abscess is opened without the danger that attends wounds of large cavities. If it is small, the whole of the matter may be allowed to flow away at once; if large, after drawing a pint, close the wound for a few hours, and then finish the operation. The lips of the wound must be kept together by sticking plaster. As there are many vessels of importance in the groin, care must be taken to avoid wounding them, and, if a surgeon can be had, he should always be applied to for this purpose. Of Fistula.

Symptoms. An abscess or ulcer in the neighborhood of the fundament, preceded by an inflamed swelling, which gives much pain. If there is no communication between the gut and the sore, it is called an incomplete, if there is, a complete fistula.

Treatment. As the tumor is often taken for piles, attention should be paid to distinguish them. In all cases apply forty or fifty leeches to the part, keep the bowels perfectly loose by a diet of rye mush, and confine the patient to his bed. If, however, the formation of matter cannot be hindered, the swelling must be opened early and a poultice applied to it, when the disease occasionally heals like any other sore; but nine times out of ten it forms a callous winding abscess, through which (if it is complete) excrement, etc., often passes. When it arrives at this point, nothing but an operation can ever be of any service.

There is another species of fistulous opening, which follows the obstruction caused by strictures, etc., in the urinary passage. The water not being able to flow through the natural canal, makes its way out between the bag and the fundament, constituting what is called fistula in perineo. It may almost be called an incurable disease; at all events, none but a surgeon can do anything to relieve it.

Of Ulcers.

By ulcers are meant holes or sores in the skin and flesh, which discharge matter. They are divided into inflamed, fungous, sloughing, and indolent ulcers in the neighborhood of carious bone, and those attended by a peculiar diseased action.

Inflamed Ulcers.

Symptoms. The margin of the sore is ragged, the skin ending in a sharp edge round it. The neighboring parts are red, swelled and painful, the bottom of the ulcer is uneven and covered with a white spongy substance. In place of healthy yellow matter, it discharges a thin fluid; the surface of it bleeds on the slightest touch.