1. Isolate the patient from other members of the family to prevent the
spread of the disease.
2. Keep the patient in bed and give a fluid diet of milk gruel, beef
tea, etc., with plenty of cold water to drink.
3. Control the fever by sponging the body with tepid water, and
relieve the pain in the throat by cold compresses, applied externally.
4. As soon as the skin shows a tendency to become scaly, apply goose
grease or clean lard with a little boracic acid powder dusted in it,
or better, perhaps, carbolized vaseline to relieve the itching and
prevent the scales from being scattered about, and subjecting others
to the contagion.
REGULAR TREATMENT.--A few drops of aconite every three hours to
regulate the pulse, and if the skin be pale and circulation feeble,
with tardy eruption, administer one to ten drops of tincture of
belladonna, according to the age of the patient. At the end of third
week, if eyes look puffy and feet swell, there is danger of Acute
Bright's disease, and a physician should be consulted. If the case
does not progress well under the home remedies suggested, a physician
should be called at once.
_WHOOPING COUGH._
DEFINITION.--This is a contagious disease which is known by a peculiar
whooping sound in the cough. Considerable mucus is thrown off after
each attack of spasmodic coughing.
SYMPTOMS.--It usually commences with the symptoms of a common cold
in the head, some chilliness, feverishness, restlessness, headache, a
feeling of tightness across the chest, violent paroxysms of coughing,
sometimes almost threatening suffocation, and accompanied with
vomiting.
HOME TREATMENT.--Patient should eat plain food and avoid cold drafts
and damp air, but keep in the open air as much as possible. A strong
tea made of the tops of red clover is highly recommended. A strong tea
made of chestnut leaves, sweetened with sugar, is also very good.
1 teaspoonful of powdered alum,
1 teaspoonful of syrup.
Mix in a tumbler of water, and give the child one teaspoonful every
two or three hours. A kerosene lamp kept burning in the bed chamber
at night is said to lessen the cough and shorten the course of the
disease.
_MUMPS._
DEFINITION.--This is a contagious disease causing the inflammation
of the salivary glands, and is generally a disease of childhood and
youth.
SYMPTOMS.--A slight fever, stiffness of the neck and lower jaw,
swelling and soreness of the gland. It usually develops in four or
five days and then begins to disappear.
HOME TREATMENT.--Apply to the swelling a hot poultice of cornmeal and
bread and milk. A hop poultice is also excellent. Take a good dose of
physic and rest carefully. A warm general bath, or mustard foot bath,
is very good. Avoid exposure or cold drafts. If a bad cold is taken,
serious results may follow.
_MEASLES._
DEFINITION.--It is an eruptive, contagious disease, preceded by cough
and other catarrhal symptoms for about four or five days. The eruption
comes rapidly in small red spots, which are slightly raised.
SYMPTOMS.--A feeling of weakness, loss of appetite, some fever, cold
in the head, frequent sneezing, watery eyes, dry cough and a hot skin.
The disease takes effect nine or ten days after exposure.
HOME TREATMENT.--Measles is not a dangerous disease in the child,
but in an adult it is often very serious. In childhood very little
medicine is necessary, but exposure must be carefully avoided, and
the patient kept in bed, in a moderately warm room. The diet should
be light and nourishing. Keep the room dark. If the eruption does not
come out promptly, apply hot baths.
COMMON TREATMENT.--Two teaspoonfuls of spirits of nitre, one
teaspoonful paregoric, one wineglassful of camphor water. Mix
thoroughly, and give a teaspoonful in half a teacupful of water every
two hours. To relieve the cough, if troublesome, flax seed tea, or
infusion of slippery-elm bark, with a little lemon juice to render
more palatable, will be of benefit.
_CHICKEN POX._
DEFINITION.--This is a contagious, eruptive disease, which resembles
to some extent small-pox. The pointed vesicles or pimples have a
depression in the center in chicken-pox, and in small pox they do not.
SYMPTOMS.--Nine to seventeen days elapse after the exposure, before
symptoms appear. Slight fever, a sense of sickness, the appearance of
scattered pimples, some itching and heat. The pimples rapidly change
into little blisters, filled with a watery fluid. After five or six
days they disappear.
HOME TREATMENT.--Milk diet, and avoid all kinds of meat. Keep the
bowels open, and avoid all exposure to cold. Large vesicles on the
face should be punctured early and irritation by rubbing should be
avoided.
_HOME TREATMENT OF DIPHTHERIA._
DEFINITION.--Acute, specific, constitutional disease, with local
manifestations in the throat, mouth, nose, larynx, wind-pipe, and
glands of the neck. The disease is infectious but not very contagious
under the proper precautions. It is a disease of childhood, though
adults sometimes contract it. Many of the best physicians of the
day consider true or membranous croup to be due to this diphtheritic
membranous disease thus located in the larynx or trachea.
SYMPTOMS.--Symptoms vary according to the severity of the attack.
Chills, fever, headache, languor, loss of appetite, stiffness of neck,
with tenderness about the angles of the jaw, soreness of the throat,
pain in the ear, aching of the limbs, loss of strength, coated tongue,
swelling of the neck, and offensive breath; lymphatic glands on side
of neck enlarged and tender. The throat is first to be seen red and
swollen, then covered with grayish white patches, which spread, and
a false membrane is found on the mucous membrane. If the nose is
attacked, there will be an offensive discharge, and the child will
breathe through the mouth. If the larynx or throat are involved,
the voice will become hoarse, and a croupy cough, with difficult
breathing, shows that the air passage to the lungs is being obstructed
by the false membrane.
HOME TREATMENT.--Isolate the patient, to prevent the spread of the
disease. Diet should be of the most nutritious character, as milk,
eggs, broths, and oysters. Give at intervals of every two or three
hours. If patient refuses to swallow, from the pain caused by the
effort, a nutrition injection must be resorted to. Inhalations of
steam and hot water, and allowing the patient to suck pellets of ice,
will give relief. Sponges dipped in hot water, and applied to the
angles of the jaw, are beneficial. Inhalations of lime, made by
slaking freshly burnt lime in a vessel, and directing the vapor to the
child's mouth, by means of a newspaper, or similar contrivance. Flour
of sulphur, blown into the back of the mouth and throat by means of
a goose quill, has been highly recommended. Frequent gargling of the
throat and mouth, with a solution of lactic acid, strong enough to
taste sour, will help to keep the parts clean, and correct the
foul breath. If there is great prostration, with the nasal passage
affected, or hoarseness and difficult breathing, a physician should be
called at once.
[Illustration]
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