MEDICAL NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1707, 3 May 1917, Page 4

MEDICAL NOTES.

INFLAMED EYELIDS. A simple treatment for sore or inflamed eyelids consists in bathing them four or five times a day with warm boraeie lotion. At night time place a little yellow oxide of mereary between the lids. This not only has the effect of restoring the lids to a normal state, but in the process of healing them it prevents the very unpleasant sticking together of the lids which is apt to occur at nigh't time. A BRONCHITIS MIXTURE. A useful stimulating mixture in many cases of chronic bronchitis, especially when occurring in old people, is the following:—Ammon, chlor., three drachms; spirit ether co., three drachms; ox. glycerrhix., three drachms; inf. senegae, to eight ounces. Of this mixture one tablespoonful may be taken two or three times a day, in an equal amount of water. NATURAL DEVELOPMENT. The child’s brain should take a normal course of development. To tins end the little one must live a simple, normal life, untrammelled by the exactions of society, carefully nourished with abundance of plain food, and afforded ample exercise, amid good bygenic environments. A writer of eminence lias said that •‘the proud mother and over-zealous nurse commence the process of mental cramming even before infancy has passed into childhood. - From lids time on children are daily being taught, apparently with the idea of destroying their childhood and making them little men and women. And this unphysiologica! process is not infrequently a factor in the production of nervous disorders. SLEEPLESSNESS AND COLD FEET. People who live sedentary lives end employ their brains actively are apt to suffer from cold feet. George Eliot is said to have written her novels with her feet in hot water on this account. Cold feet are very inimical to sleep, and sleeplessness from this cause -may be remedied by the simple means of a hol-wuler bottle, without any recourse to drugs. Again, heat is inimical la sleep. Sojourns in very hot climates find this the most distressing effect of the climate. On the other hand, the soporific effect of cold U notoriously one of the greatest dangers of Arctic travelling. The desire to sink to sleep in the .mow is well known to he almost overpowering. Tins teaches us to impure whether 1 he palienl who complain.of sleeplessness does not load himself 100 heavily with bedclothes. In souk' ('uses the removal of a down quill or a blanket is a very effectual hypnotic. .MOIST AND DRY AIR. ft is generally recognised that persons with corns or sufferers from chronic rheumatism can prophesy the approach of rain, hut it is not generally known that there is a very good scientific reason to aceouni for (his. When (he atmosphere becomes charged with water a definite effect is made on all surface swellings, or scars, which become painful ami tender. Perspiration is arrested, and the lungs discharge less moisture, thus throwing additional work on the kidneys. People who suffer from kidney disease arc consequently very sensitive to changes in the moisture of the air. On the contrary —or, perhaps one should say, complementary — the dry winds lead to an increased evaporation of moisture from the skin, using up in this way a large amount of animal heat. And those persons who are unusually sensative to dry winds will thus understand why it is (hat no amount of extra clothing protects them satisfactorily from the miserable feeling of physical depression brought ahout by the dryness as much as the actual coldness of the air. TREATMENT OF BURNS. The most important matter in the treatment of burns is the avoidance of poisoning, which is one of the great set dangers associated with burns, and often leads to serious trouble even in the case of only slight injury. The strictest anti-

septic measures must he taken, therefore, from the beginning. A good routine practice is first of all to prick with a boiled needle any blisters that may show themselves, first bathing the part with a solution of carbolic acid of a strength one in twenty. The whole surface affected should then he covered with a piece of soft linen or lint which has been soaked in a solution of picric acid. This should be left on for two days. Any new blisters should then he pricked with a needle as before, and the surface covered with a piece of lint thickly spread with a mixture of vaseline and horaeic ointment. This should he covered with a thick layer of antiseptic wool and a bandage. If a burn actually becomes septic in spite of these precautions, hot horacic fomentations should he applied every four hours, until the wound looks healthy, when the dressings described above should he used. FRESH AIR. Readers will have noticed the frequency with which inquirers are advised to seek outdoor exercise. There is no condition of the body, either in health or disease, which fresh air does not benefit. It is commonly known that the breath given out from the lungs is laden with impurities; hut few people apply this knowledge to their daily lives. Everyone must have noticed the sleepiness and yawning that overcomes people in a hot room where there is inadequate ventilation. The The act of yawning is an involuntary effort of the lungs to take in more oxygen or fresh air than the atmosphere is supplying. The lungs are continually asking for oxygen, as every process of the body is dependent, ultimately, on the oxygen which finds its way into the blood. The blood is constantly journeying to and from the heart, and in the process passes through the lungs, where it is subjected to a cleansing by means of the oxygen which the lungs have breathed in, and, at the same lime, the impurities are taken up , r.i expelled by the breath. It follows, then, that if (he air which the lungs are taking up is imperfectly oxygenated, or if any part of it: is being breathed a second time, as must happen in a small,'ill-ventilated room, especially if arlriticial heat or lighting, such as gas, is employed, the condition of the blood, and consequently of I lie organs and the whole of the body, becomes impure.

HOW COLDS ARE CAUGHT

If will he found that, if (he yawning or sighing is not relieved by the introduction of fresh air, headache ensues, and it is in this state that the body becomes subject to what arc known as (-hills; that- is to say, if a (‘banco draught or sudden encounter with cold air or damp is experienced the body is 100 devitalised to react to the shock. “Catching cold,’’ is almost always the result, not of cold, hu( of some lowered condition of (he body through want of fresh air. Thai is why colds' arc so often attributed to coming out of a hot room into Ihe cold night nir. (1 is true that this is where the trouble is felt to begin, hut the real mischief was done inside the stuffy room.

In winter the majority of people feel the almost irresistible temptation to sit over (ires, shut Ihe windows, and get really snug and cosy. But if there is a (ire in the room it is always advisable not to sit 100 near it, nor to sit for 100 long a period in the room at all. The window should always he open if only at the top. Belter still is it not. to depend too much on this external heat, hut to try to keep up the circulation of the blood by exercise. Those people who lake long walks into the country or busy themselves with outdoor jobs, instead of frowsting over tires, will appreciate the difference in tlie healthy glow produced by their activities and the rather stuffy and enervated feeling which results from sitting at the fireside. It is a. good plan, 100, at night: to have plenty of blankets, and to sleep with the window wide open even when the weather is quite cold. At night time, when the breathing becomes .slower and more sustained, and the air penetrates more deeply into the smaller air cells of (lie lungs than in our daily lighter and more superficial breathing, it is well to have the surrounding atmosphere as pure as possible.