TALKS ON HEALTH

Greymouth Evening Star, 14 January 1933, Page 10

TALKS ON HEALTH

BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. COUGHING. The purpose of the act of coughing is to bring up phlegm; if the cough is hard and dry, the less you cough the better. I often hear people coughing in church or in a train who ought to restrain . the cough and smother it. How can anyone think that h e can cough away a catarrh of the larynx! The fiendish pleasure that some men seem to take in making a loud noise should bo corrected by the police. Public nuisances should be amenable io the law. There is about as much chance of coughing up a swollen lining to the windpipe as there is of coughing up your boots. WHY IT IS HARMFUL. That loud, barking coqgh that 1 so strongly object to brings several harmful results to the patient. In the first place it rasps the delicate fining of th e bronchial tubes and vocal chords; that increases the irritation in the throat; the healjng of a raw, red throat is delayed by the constant coughing. Then the constant coughing exhausts the unfortunate patient. If the cough were restrained the weariness would be nothing like so bad. One of the chief coughing muscles is the midriff or diaphragm, it is inside and separates the abdomen from the chest. When it is oveiworked by all that senseless coughing, it aches and gives a pain in tlie chest and back.

FOR PITY’S SAKE.

No one has ever choked from a dry cough; it is no use saying that you must cough or choke. In sanatoria, the rule is made that excessive coughing must not be indulged in, or penalties will follow it. It is altogether different when the cough is not dry, but associated with the formation of much phlegm. Then the cough serves the purpose of fetching up the mucus that, would block the air-tubes if it were not coughed HPEven then the coughing should he reduced to a minimum. The sad truth is that we all like and a bark that can be heard all down the street may induce some passer-by to give forth a kindly remark. So, as we all enjoy being pitied, we cough for' pity’s sake. A regir ment of soldiers in church used to cough the roof off nearly until the order was given that excessive coughing would be punished; and then it stopped. HOW A COLD TRAVELS.

Inflammation can travel along a. living surface as ink travels along blotting-paper. That is why a cold that begins in the head can travel down to the chest. The cold does not take a flying leap; it is a continuous process all the way down. The spread of the inflammatory catarrh explains many cases of jaundice. Aunties and other kindhearted persons who undertake the care and cure of illness are under no necessity of studying the structure of the body any more, than a. man who is going to mend bicycles is under the necessity of learning how they are put together. But we poor, downtrodden wretches of doctors are compelled by a harsh law to learn anatpmy for about two years. And one of the things we learn is that the Ijv.er js connected with the intestine py a tube called the bile-duct. The upper end if "this. dqpt lends by one way into tlie gall-bladder and by another straight into the substance of the liver. The lower end opens out into the bowel just beyond the exit from the stomach; when food comes into this portion of .the bowel the bile-duct conveys bile into the bowel and that helps to digest the food. Nqw we ar.e getting nearer to the discovery of a great truth. Catarrh of the stomach leads to catarrh of the intestine just beyond the stomach; tjie inflammation . travels along so easily. The next victim of the spreading catarrh lies ready to hand—the "bile-duct. Up this duct goes the inflammatory process, and then what, happens? Well, every duct that is inflamed I s swollen; that is why when you have catarrh of the nose the air-way is blocked by the swelling.

INCURABLE DISEASES. I wish I could give my readers some steady advice, which would be listened to, about incurable diseases. Suppose a man has his arm he knows a new one will never grow, and he makes UP his mind to the loss of the arm. If he loses an eye, he does not answer advertisements of people who promise to grow another eye for him; he needs no telling that it is an impossibility. And whether we like it or not, we have got to put up with stern facts, and the sooner we frankly admit that there is no cure known for certain diseases the better it will be for our peace of pocket. There is enough money spent, or rather thrown away, in the vain attempt to discover a cure for everything that is incurable to keep all invalids in affluence and give every patient in all the hospitals in England a free holiday for a fortnight in a convalescent home.

COMMON SENSE. I quite appreciate the despair of anyone suffering from a complaint which the doctor says is incurable. The well-meaning but misguided friends endeavour to raise false hopes. They do not understand how cruel it is to keep on bolstering the poor sufferer up with hopes that are doomed to failure. It is far kinder and much more, sensible, and, what is very important, much cheaper, to obtain a first-class opinion, to abide by it, and refrain from the exhausting and expensive course of trying the remedies vaunted by the unscrupulous. If once you are so unfortunate as to become the subject of an incurable complaint, accept the situation with a brave heart, and for the love of common sense, keep your good money in your pocket.