MEDICAL NOTES.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5567, 16 May 1896, Page 1

MEDICAL NOTES.

COLD AIR FOR CQNSUMPTjVES. There are. now six sanitariums in Germany at which consumptives are treated by constant exposure to air at a low temperature. Currents of cold air are allowed to pass through the bedroom at night, and during the day as much of the time is spent in the open air as possible. The pure cold air quiets cough, lessens temperature, arrests night sweats, improves appetite, and modifies or arrests the course of the disease. GLYCERINE ASA SKIN APPLICATION. Glycerine is often used as a skin application. I am convinced this is a wrong, proceeding, for glycerine has a faculty of extracting water from any part to which it is applied, and in the case of the skin this result is not to be desired. It will tend to make the skin dry and harsh, a condition the exact opposite of that seen in health. Lanolin, ivMeli is tko natural fat of thia skin, is. a far better application, and can be made the basis of many applications of value 'in preventing the roughness and chapping which occur in winter. PADS ABOUT FOOD. It has never been scientifically demonstrated that fish and other phosphoric foods can appreciably improve the brain and mind. Fishermen, for example, and fishmongers, who may lie supposed to live largely upon fish, have never shown themselves to be in any measurable degree more intellectual than their neighbours. Indeed, it may be .plausibly argued that they are a little less so. The truth is, that that particular food which best agrees with the particular individual, and which best maintains his general health at a high level, is the best for the brain and every othei; organ of the body, as well as for the whole num. Common experience haa long ago formulated the saying that " what is one man's meat is another man's poison." Science now conies forward to tell us exactly the same thing, and to impress upon everyone of us the necessity of finding out the diet best suited to ourselves, and sticking to it. — Hospital. A NOVEL CURE FOR COLDS. A good many new cures for colds have lately 'been published. Perhaps the m<3st novel and the most hopeful is Dr Schnee's. Schnee employs what may be considered a

massage variant. He percusses the terj minal branches of the nerves ' supplying the mucous membrane of the nose with a small hammer made of indiarubber. Slight shocks upon terminal nerves have the effect, as has been experimentally de- [ monstrated, of contracting tho blood vessels. That is, they excite the activity of tho vaso-motor nerves. Stronger shocks produce dilatation of the same blood vessels, no doubt, by over-stimulating and so exhausting the vaso-motors. Here, then, we have a method of exercising a great deal of control over those nasal blood vessels, whose altered condition constitutes the initial stage of coryza. In the inception period of .a cold, what is wanted is to set up contraction of nasal and naso-pharynjro-laryngeal blood vessels. For this purpose slight " tappings " with the india-rubber hammer are to be resorted to. The locality to which the percussion should be applied is the forehead, just above IKb root of the nose; and the "taps" should follow a line extending. horizontally outwards over the eyebrows. The irfethod is interesting, ahd based on physiological reasoning, — Hospital. ■ • -.. .