Excerpt from Notes on a Case of Nasal Caries, Complicated With Meningitis, Successfully Treated by Means of the Surgical Drill: Read Before the American Laryngological Association at the First National Medical Congress, 1888

Mr. M., an intelligent, Well born gentleman, aged thirty one after consulting a number of physicians for relief from a severe nasal disease, and obtaining no satisfaction, finally sought the advice of Dr. Hubbard, of New York, who promptly referred him to me for treatment. The nasal disease for which the patient consulted us had, through neglect and maltreatment, so completely undermined his health and shattered his nerves that it was found necessary to resort to the liberal use of morphine, to enable him to traverse the distance (about thirty miles) in tervening between his home and the city. The symptom most complained of was a severe headache, which had harassed him almost continuously for about five months, and, despite the assiduous use of opiates, he had been able to procure but little rest. The pain in the head was for the most part referred to the temporal region, and associated with it there was marked tenderness of the scalp, evinced when slight pressure was exercised. A minor, though at times exceedingly annoying symptom, tinnitus aurium, was also present. Much discomfort was caused by the constant accumulation in the nares, and gravitation into the throat, of masses of green crusts, the removal of which provoked an offensive stench, causing much distress to the patient and those in his immediate neighborhood. In addition to the dis charges of putrefactive matter from the anterior and posterior nares, the patient noticed that upon forcibly blowing the nostril, some fetid fluid issued through a small perforation in the palate near the sockets of the central incisors. The great loss of flesh occa sioned by the nasal putrefactive changes, and the destructive process permitted to go untreated for so many months, had reduced the unfortunate man to a state of extreme emaciation. Much valuable time, it was learned, had been lost by the sufferer's worse than useless effort to procure relief from the so-called compound oxygen treatment. Inquiries naturally directed to the discovery of syphilis as affording a possible clue to the peculiar morbid manifestations, elicited the fact that the patient had been treated for a venereal affection several years since he, however, claimed that the physician had pronounced the trouble of a mild type, presumably a chancroid. The state ment that catarrh had existed as far back as the memory of the patient could reach merits mention, inasmuch as it throws some light upon the etiology of the nasal lesion.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.