Thanatosis

“ Serjeant Shee: In idiopathic tetanus the patient is always uncomfortable for some time before the attack. The appetite is not much affected. He complains more of the muscles of his neck. He may within twelve hours of a serious attack preserve his relish for food. I never heard a patient complain of want of appetite. I have known cases of idiopathic tetanus in which the first paroxysm occurred in bed. I have known this disease occur to women after confinement or miscarriage. Sometimes one of the premonitory symptoms is a difficulty in swallowing. ”

“ You may know a hot intemperament by the thirst, by the fetid and feculent eructations if compelled to take food, and from the circumstance that cold and intractable substances are most easily digested; and a cold by the opposite, for they neither have thirst, nor can they endure cold things, and they have sometimes acid eructations. Of those who have anorexia from humours, they who suffer from thin and sharp humours, have gnawing pain at the stomach, and are more affected with nausea and thirst. When the humours become putrid, they sometimes have fever. ”

“ Résumé of Symptoms.—If we boil down the matter, extracting only the symptoms and changes observed during the above experiments with Parthenina, we have the following: Heaviness and dulness of head, tendency to vertigo, malaise, apathy, lassitude, profuse and very fluid salivation, sensation of heat and weight in the stomach, increased appetite, gastric intolerance, nausea and vomiting. Increased stupor, desire to be quiet, refusal of food, and indifference. Excitation of the heart beats, or slow beating of the heart ”

“ Or, he has consulted a physician who has usually given him a tonic; a tonic is something to stimulate the jaded appetite, or compel the surfeited stomach to do more work than it should.
Recent research has shown that this overworking of the digestive organs is a fruitful source of physical disease, that it dulls the mind and chills the spirit. Our loving Mother Nature punishes each excess, because pain quickest draws our attention to our wrongdoing. The flesh strives with us as well as the Spirit, for we reap in our own bodies the fruit of our ways ”

“ Taken in excess it produces cerebral excitement, sleeplessness, and general nervous irritability. The tannin contained in its infusions also interferes with the flow of the saliva, diminishes the digestive activity of the stomach, and impedes the action of the bowels. In this view the large quantity of strong tea used by the poor—and especially by the sedentary poor,—while serving to blunt the keen tooth of hunger, must work incalculable havoc with the digestive and nervous systems of the consumers. ”

“ There is nausea, with vomiting of the contents of the stomach. These matters are sometimes mixed with blood and stringy masses of mucus. The sickness is accompanied by diarrhœa or dysentery, swelling of the abdomen, and increased pain. The countenance becomes flushed and often swollen, though it is occasionally pallid and anxious; the lips and tongue get white and shrivelled; there is frequently some dyspnœa, while the pulse is small, or wiry and frequent; and death is preceded by faintness, cramps, insensibility, or convulsions. ”

“ Jaundice and derangement of the nervous system follow, along with pains in the head, and such prostration of strength that the patient speedily loses all appetite; the hue of the whites assumes a leaden colour, and a total inability to sleep ensues, which aggravates the mental depression of the unhappy individual, who, in spite of all his ills, cannot relinquish the use of the herb to which he owes his sufferings, but craves brandy in addition. ”

“ Give him something to whip up his brain and his body, something to drive the spurs into them. 'What I want,' he says, 'is a really strong tonic'; though, if he knew that before, what was the use of coming to the doctor? Or he would like to be told to take a glass of whisky-and-water when he is tired, which is the maddest and most disastrous advice that could be given.
"The man who has been ill-treating his stomach, eating too much or too well, also demands a tonic—something to give him an appetite so that he may eat more. And his poor over-wrought stomach is all the time crying out for rest. ”

“ When there is weakness of the nervous system, the disease manifests itself through [pg 624] various organs. Hence, the palpitation of the heart, dyspepsia or acute attacks of indigestion, with colicky pains and heaviness after meals, with eructations or belchings of gas, or local discomfort and unnatural action affecting, at different times, almost every organ of the body. It is well known that insanity may result from the loss of sleep and constant brooding over the symptoms that the patient fails to properly understand. ”

“ Nature has also, on the other side, helped me to some of hers: as not to be able to endure more than two full meals in one day, without overcharging my stomach, nor a total abstinence from one of those meals without filling myself with wind, drying up my mouth, and dulling my appetite; the finding great inconvenience from overmuch evening air; for of late years, in night marches, which often happen to be all night long, after five or six hours my stomach begins to be queasy, with a violent pain in my head, so that I always vomit before the day can break. ”

“ There are sparks before the eyes, giddiness, noises in the ears, and a creeping feeling about the body. There is also very commonly anæsthesia of the fingers and toes, and later of the extremities, of the back, and even of the tongue. Diarrhœa, vomiting, colic, and other signs of intestinal irritation seldom fail to be present; there are also tetanic spasms of the muscles, rising in some cases to well-marked tetanus; epilepsy, faintings, aberrations of vision, amaurosis, and amblyopia are frequent; the skin becomes of a yellow or earthy colour, and is covered with a cold sweat ”

“ The symptoms appear soon after the ingestion, and consist of a feeling of burning in the mouth, spreading downwards to the stomach, increased secretion of saliva, and difficulty of swallowing; then follow violent vomiting and diarrhœa, with great pain in the bowels, often tenesmus; there is also headache, giddiness, a feeling of anxiety, and the pupils are dilated. The consciousness is ordinarily intact; the pulse is weak and slow, and the breathing embarrassed ”

“ In some instances the skin is cold and livid, in others it is bathed in sweat. So also the countenance may be either ghastly or placid, the pupils may even be dilated, and the pulse may be unaffected, or so small and frequent as to be scarcely appreciable. Vomiting sometimes occurs, with slight reaction, so that hopes of recovery are entertained. But frequently there is a relapse, the comatose state returns, and death quickly follows, occasionally preceded by convulsions. ”

“ Such neurotic symptoms may prove even more bothersome to the patient than the symptoms due to his underlying affection, and may, by interfering with nutrition, hamper recovery. The appetite of a patient who is worrying about a chronic disease will be disturbed, and, as a consequence of insufficient food, constipation and a whole train of attendant evils may ensue. Headache, sleeplessness, worry at slight irritation and exaggerated complaints from slight pain may all be due to this worry and not to the underlying disease. ”

“ In many persons there exists a constitutional tendency to the excessive formation of blood, occasioning a plethoric condition, and thereby rendering the individual liable to a great many diseases; others again suffer from an exalted or diminished sensibility of the nervous system, [2] inducing some of the greatest woes to which humanity is liable.
Many different elements are combined in the structure of the various organs of the body, and among these fat, in suitable proportion, must be recognized as necessary for the due and equable performance of the several organic functions. ”

“ If one is out of health there is practically a poisoning of the system, and when we have a “bilious headache” we see colours and stars because there is a pressure upon the blood-vessels of the eye. The effects of a disordered stomach, induced by drinking too much, are well known; objects are seen double, and most ghosts may be traced to a disordered state of health of mind or body, brought on by excitement or fatigue. ”

“ But it may be said that the blood produces these affections, since, after loss of blood, the patients are relieved. I do not agree with this, and I say that the blood is not in such cases the cause of these ailments; because fat people, both men and women, have no more blood than thin persons: I maintain that they have even less. It is granted that loss of blood in cases of headache, vertigo, alleviate and even cure these affections ”

“ The symptom is not to be regarded as alarming when the fluid raised is yellow or yellowishgreen in hue, and when nausea occurs at infrequent intervals. But, if the color changes to a vivid green or, as it does in instances of acute organic derangement, to black, the case may be considered as most serious in character and of doubtful prognosis. When nausea is present during a fast, it is far better to aid elimination in ridding the stomach of its contents through the mouth than to permit them to remain with the certainty of partial reabsorption and re-toxication. ”

“ The strong objection to the medicine I conceive to be its being so extremely unmanageable; it is impossible to say whether the depression of the vital powers that must ensue will be just sufficient to induce that relaxation and debility necessary or favourable to reduction, or whether it will proceed uncontrollable to such a degree as to extinguish life. In general it produces intolerable nausea and depression, universal relaxation of the muscles, coldness of the surface, with clammy exudation, vomiting, violent retching, vertigo, and perhaps insensibility. ”

“ The prime cause of consumption is defective assimilation: the tissues, from lack of sufficient nerve-stimulus, are incapable of appropriating food. How absurd, therefore, to suppose that narcosis, which impairs the stimulating energy of the nerves, can check an existing tendency to consumption! What the consumptive person needs is stimulus, not paralysis. But it is easy to believe that the same impaired nutrition of the nerves which may in one person end in consumption, may in another person act as a predisposing cause of narcosis. ”

“ If allowed to stand stewing for long it is nothing short of a poison. For then it is converted into a concentrated extract of tannin, which has a most irritating effect on the wall of the stomach, producing a secretion of acid liquid, causing heartburn and perhaps injuring the delicate mucous membrane to the point of ulceration.
There is also another deleterious substance present called thein, and this has a specially pernicious influence on the nervous system when taken in excess. ”

“ As the disease progressed the vomited matter became strongly coloured with bile, and was of a strong yellow colour. The opression on the heart also increased, until at length respiration was almost impeded. The heart and pulses also gradually lost power, and latterly the lower portion of the body was almost paralysed, the limbs being stiff, and the whole frame, from the waist downward, very heavy and cold. The patient also suffered from severe cold perspirations, as well as from heat and irritation of the upper portion of the body, and from entire inability to sleep. ”

“ They often suffer from palpitation of the heart, sick headaches, coldness of the hands and feet, dull heavy feelings, a sense of fatigue and a loss of flesh. They also complain of creeping sensations in the loins, of pricking in the back, of twitching and jerking of the muscles, of muscular weakness, of lumbar pain and asthma. The intestinal canal shows a general derangement, as coated tongue, poor appetite, sense of weight in the epigastrium after eating, flatulence, sluggishness of the bowels and constipation. ”

“ Several of these are obvious symptoms, and are often complicated. Inappetency is generally accompanied with nausea. Foulness or feculence in the stomach, is indicated by weight and load in that region, anxiety, nausea, eructation, disagreeable taste in the mouth, foul tongue: the state of the gustatory organ is some index to that of the stomach. Acidity in excess will excite eructation, flatulence, heartburn, gnawing pain in that part, irregular appetite and craving, colicks, gripes, diarrhœa, vomiting. ”

“ He was no longer troubled with depression, insomnia, and fears; began to gain in weight, appetite improved, felt energy flowing in; began to look for work in real earnest, finally found it, and kept at it.
Man, aged forty-three years, suffered from palpitation of the heart, fainted easily, especially on physical examination by physician, or at the beginning of medical treatment. He suffered from indigestion for which he had been under treatment for a number of years by physicians who gave him medicine for his bowels and also from time to time kept on washing his stomach. ”

“ In the trials referred to, it was shown that medical men might easily mistake the effects of small doses of antimony given at intervals for the action of disease—the symptoms being great nausea, followed by vomiting, chronic diarrhœa, alternating with constipation, small frequent pulse, loss of voice, great muscular weakness, depression, with coldness of the skin and a clammy perspiration. ”