ARTICLE XLII.

THE PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF HYDROTHERAPEUTIC MEASURES.

BY CHARLES S. MILLET, M.D.

OF BROCKTON,

READ JUNE 8, 1904.

THE PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF HYDROTHERAPEUTIC MEASURES.

It will be my purpose, in the short time that I shall detain you, not to discuss all the hydrotherapeutic procedures, but only those with which I have had a personal experience. These procedures, like so many other things in medicine, are at first perplexing and seem well-nigh impossible in private practice; but if they are analyzed a little, and one begins to use them, he will soon find that their application is as simple as it is effective.

The skin contains far more nerves, blood vessels and glands than any other organ; in fact, so numerous are the blood vessels that it is said that they will hold half of all the blood in the body. Its function is to convey impressions to the brain and other nerve centres, to carry off waste products and to regulate body heat. In other words, it is the organ of sensation, the next most important sense to that of sight. It is a powerful excretory organ, sifting out from the blood carbonic acid gas, various other products of metabolism, and water, in which enormous quantities of pathogenic bacteria have been found.

The heat of the body is produced by the combustion of non-nitrogenous substances, chiefly in the muscles, and it is given off by perspiration and radiation from the cutaneous surface.

Hydrotherapy, then, has to do with sensation, excretion and heat radiation, and if we could only keep these facts in

our minds when applying this sovereign remedy, the application would be much easier; it would be oftener made; and the results would be more satisfactory.

Of course, in endeavoring to influence any one of these three functions it is impossible not to affect the others to a greater or less degree; but at the same time, it is not at all difficult to so use water as to vary these impressions and cause the one most desired to become prominent.

Furthermore, by applying water to the skin at various degrees of temperature and in various ways, we can, through reflex action, produce decided effects upon the mind, the central nervous system and all the internal organs.

Let us first consider the treatment of fever, which is largely, if not wholly, due to diminished heat radiation; there is nothing that will produce quite so much perturbation in the average medical mind as an excessively high temperature. The personal experience of any man who has been twenty years in practice must have carried him through a disappointing period with so-called antipyretics,― the principal one used being acetanilide, I fancy. I well remember a case of typhoid fever, in which the temperature reached 105 degrees before the end of the first week, that I treated with large doses of this drug, some fifteen years ago. The medical magazines at that time were teeming with articles, telling of the efficacy of these coal-tar preparations.

Convinced by the brilliancy of the results claimed, I proceeded to give it on alternate days, and in liberal doses. The effect upon the temperature was as marvellous as it was temporary; but the resulting anæmia and peculiar lividity were most distressing. And when Dr. Fitz, whom I called in consultation, wondered at it, I must confess I did not dare to tell him how heroically I had dosed the young woman, for I had not forgotten his method of showing us our mistakes in the class-room, and I feared he might use it here, the cause was so just.