Beware of Auto-heart.

Otago Witness, Issue 2762, 20 February 1907, Page 68

Beware of Auto-heart.

Health Commissioner James Bosley sounded a note of warning to automobilistb. In plain terms he de< ".ared that speed mania and the danger attending travel at high speed are undoubtedly responsible for a condition which he described as the auto heart and which is liable to cause death. '"Automobi'lists with hearts that have tho slightest tendency to weakness should be cautious," said Dr Bosley. "The excite ment of rapid travelling out in the open causes an overstrain on the heart, and ;f; f this organ is weak the condition of the automobilist is a most dangerous one. Something slightly out of the ordinary, like a narrow escape from a collision or the run ning down of a man, might give tho finishing touch and death might follow. "To say that speeding has the general effect among automobilists of bringing on a special heart trouble common to all autnmobilists is, of course, far 'rora the ttuth. If this were true we would find a practically similar condition among locomotive engineers. Instead of tho engineers being as a body men subject to heart disease, they are generally very healthy. They approach their work by degrees, however, and become haiden^ to it before they are put upon fast trains. "With automobihsts it is different. Often a man will go out for an automobile rideafter a long period of sedentary and unexciting work. Once in the country the speed of the machine will be steadily increased, and with each increase the excitement makes greater the strain upon the heart of the weak automobili--t. "It is, in fact, the occasional automobilist — the man or woman who gi>es out only once, in a while — who is most subject to attacks of what may be called auto heart. The professionals, like the men who took part in the big road race on Long Island recently, are trained to their woik, just as locomotive eng.neera are tiained, and even the greatest bursts of 6peed probably have no effect upon them." Dr Bosloy added that he had not yrt come acoss in his prhate practice a ca-,o of heait trouble which could be ascribed to the automobile habit nor had he heard of a well authenticated case, but he believed such a thing as the auto heart was pos'-ible, just a-- it is poosible for persons uith uoak hearts to bring en troublo by exciting themselves in other waj». He also said that he had noticed leading physicians in other cities had discovered a tendency to heat trouble among certain cla-^cs of autoniobilists and had sounded a note '/ warning similar to that which he gave.— Baltimore Nous.