History of medical practice in Illinois - Bushnell Historical Society

122 History of Medical Practice in IllinoisThe largest number of cases reported on any one day was 175 on October10th. Of the number of persons attacked, 970 died, or a mortality of 1in 206 of the inhabitants, and the number of those attacked was 1 in 126.Dr. W. R. Marsh of Chicago, who presented this report, stated: "I amunable to perceive, from a somewhat careful perusal of the literature ofthis disease, that any very marked changes in the mode of treatment havebeen proposed, or attempted with unusual success, in this epidemic, eitherhere or elsewhere. Nor, in the pathology of the disease do Isee that theprofession have made undoubted progress of great magnitude, even sincethe epidemic of 1831-32. . . . We have learned that proper sanitary andhygienic measures are competent to deprive the cholera of its terrors almostas certainly as has vaccination those of smallpox."At this same meeting Dr. Hosmer A. Johnson gave demonstrations oftracings of the pulse in various diseases with Marey's sphygmograph.The Chicago Board of Health was recreated during the year.1868The third epidemic of cholera was on the wane in Illinois by the time ofthe annual meeting of the State Society and Dr. N. S. Davis gave a lengthyreport on its pathology and treatment. He stated that the specific cause ofcholera was still a mystery; "probably highly poisonous organic bodiesdeveloped in the gastric and intestinal evacuations of patients; capable ofbeing transported from place to place by such evacuations either freshlyvoided or adhering to clothing or by diffusion in the soil when there is awater bearing stratum near the surface." He did not think that "vibrionesof various sizes seen under the microscope" were specific cholera poisons.Pathologically, Dr. Davis felt that there was "a direct diminution of thatelementary property of living matter which I call 'vital affinity' coupledwith impaired contractility or partial paralysis of the capillary vascularsystem, or more properly the arterioles, and a special sensibility of themucous membranes of the alimentary canal. . . . Exhaustion of the wateryand saline elements of the blood, as leaves the whole mass viscid and unoxygenatedconstituting the stage of collapse." He advocated increase ofvital affinity and vascular contractility and diminution of morbid sensitivityof stomach and bowels, but he did not say how.An excellent supplementary report of the Committee on Medical Practicewas presented by Dr. E. P. Cook of Mendota on the effect of soil, winds,rainfall and temperature. He noted that prevalent diseases during the pastyear had been chiefly inflammatory, becoming more common than formerly,and that their cause was so obscure and treatment so empirical that therewas opened a wide and fruitful field for critical investigation.An innovation in the Northwestern Medical and Surgical Journal was a