Diseases > Domestic medicine

DOMESTIC MEDICINE. Sill'J
every eight or ten hours, till the symptoms abate.
Ease, cheerfulness, and tranquillity of mind, are here
of the greatest importance.
When a looseness proceeds from acrid or poisonous
substances taken into the stomach, the patient must
drink large quantities of diluting liquors, with oily
or fat broths, to promote vomiting and purging.
Afterwards, if there be reason to suspect that the
bowels are inflamed, bleeding will be necessary.
Small doses of laudanum may likewise be taken to
remove their irritation.
When the gout, repelled from the extremities,
occasions a looseness, it ought to be promoted by
gentle doses of rhubarb, or other mild purgatives.
The gouty matter is likewise to be solicited towards
the extremities by warm fomentations, cataplasms, &c.
The perspiration ought at the same time to be pro¬
moted by warm diluting liquors ; as wine-whey, with
spirits of hartshorn, or a few drops of liquid lau¬
danum in it.
When a looseness proceeds from worms, which
may be known from the sliminess of the stools, mixed
with pieces of decayed worms, &c. medicine must be
given to kill andcarry off these vermin, as the powder
of tin, with purges of rhubarb and calomel. After¬
wards lime-water, either alone, or with a small
quantity of rhubarb infused, will be proper to
strengthen the bowels, and prevent the new genera¬
tion of worms.
A looseness is often occasioned by drinking bad
water. When this is the case, the disease generally
proves epidemical. When there is reason to believe
that this or any other disease proceeds from the use
of unwholesome water, it ought immediately to be
changed, or if that cannot be done, it may be cor¬
rected by mixing with it quick-lime, chalk, or the
like.