POISONED HEART

Greymouth Evening Star, 29 December 1934, Page 2

POISONED HEART

REMARKABLE CURE. The astonishing recovery of a young woman stricken with what has hitherto been regarded as a fatal form of heart disease is recorded by Dr. Maurice Davidson physician to the Brompton Hospital and to the Miller General Hospital, S.E., in the current issue of the “Postgraduate Medical Journal,” states the “Daily Mail.” The grave condition from which the patient was suffering is known to doctors as “septic endocarditis.” This is characterised by a persisting state of septicaemia, in which the primary focus of infection is centred within the heart itself upon one of the delicate valvular structures. For three months this woman’s life wavered in the balance. The picture she presented was one of grave general poisoning, in which the chief symptoms were a high irregular temperature, the presence of “murmurs” in the heart which altered from day to day, marked pallor, drenching perspirations, .joint pains, and at, times extreme delirium. At tho end of three months, contrary to all expectations, the symptoms abated, and she made a slow but complete recovery, and has now returned to work. Blood antiseptics were first employed in an effort to sterilise the infected circulation, while the patient’s resistance was fortified by the use of a potent rfnti-serum and a. vaccine. This intensive attack, however, is not given complete credit for the patient’s recovery, for, as Dr. Davidson points out, the favourable result might well have been due to the natural defence mechanism of the body. The moral of- this case is that no matter how gravely ill a person may be, it is never wise to give up hope, and in the counsel of the physician there should, be no room for despair.