TALKS ON HEALTH

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19840, 14 May 1927, Page 16 (Supplement)

TALKS ON HEALTH

BY A FAMILY DOCTOR

FRESH AIR WITHOUT COLD. In cold weather your love of fresh air (if you have any) is put to the test. We can all sl°ep with the windows open in the warm summer nights, but I am afraid some cf the windows get banged to in the winter. Do not make the mistake of thinking that we who preach the doctrine of fresh air wish you to be cold; cold is no part of the treatment. Every sensible doctor wants you to keep the bedroom window open, but no doctor wishes you to be cold in the night. If your feet are cold you can wear socks, if your body is cold you can put something more on the bed. if you have a bad circulation, and your flingers get cold, you can wear gloves; keep your windows open. Be brave! do stick it for my sake. If you find your strength of mind failing.! drive a nail in the window sash so that you cannot shut the window entirely. Breathing Impure Air. You can never have large ideas and a love of liberty if you breathe stuffy air. The air that comes out of your lungs has been partially used up; when you breathe it a second time, it is ' further robbed of its freshness; and when for ten solid hours you inhale the same air over and over again, the air in the room is vitiated and impure. If only your lungs could speak! When your stomach is in need of food it speaks in no uncertain voice; but when the lungs are calling for fresh air, their voice cannot always be understood of the people. Nevertheless, the lungs to speak: that headache and weary feel ing, that sallow complexion and pale skin, those dark circles under the eyes, are signs that more fresh air is needd. The voice of the lungs falls on unheeding ears, and the voice of common sense has to be called in aid. However, experience has taught me that appealing to the common sense of the multitude is not very productive of good: noth-, ing will produce an effect but fining and imprisonment. Therefore, be it known by these presents. that anyone found sleeping with the window shut will be very severely dealt with. The Starvation Cure. For a bilious attack or any derangement of the interior from over-feeding. 1 heart ly recommend the starvation [cure. You must understand that the i liver is th*- dorrhouse where food can be kept until it is. wanted. Half-way ’hiuugh heavy meal the liver has had ' ■ enough; its storage room is taxed to its | utmost. Your poor old liver, gasping jand apoplectic. and with perspiration j pourb:v dowri its face, cannot cope with the work, willing servant though tt is, i ami smaii wonder you get pains. In pity’s i name, try the starvation treatment. Take nothing but hot water for twelve <>r eighteen hours. Yourselves, you only work six days a week, and shirk all you ran even then. Have you no mercy on your digestive organs that you make them work seven days a week? Wait, till they form a trade union. Is Sunday a day of rest for iyour liver? I don’t think. Poultices Should be Light. i When you put a poultice on a child’s chest to relieve the pain and distress of an attack of bronchitis, be sure vou make it light. F have seen heavy poultices weighing on a child’s chest like a ton of lead, and every time the poor little thing’s chest heaved in breathing it had to lift the extra weight of the poultice. Poultices must I be light, and never placed so as to imj pede the breathing. I am not a great [believer in those linseed horrors —they ; soon get cold and clammy. I know , that my old friend Aunt Maria is a strong advocate of them because she saved her husband’s life with a poultice, whereas the poor old fellow just scraped through in spite of the discomfort the poultice gave him. Try it for yourself; lie on your back in bed and put a heavy cushion with a book on top of it on your chest; you will soon appreciate my objection to poultice. A Blister For Earache. Tor earache, due to inflammation of th" ear. a blister the size of a shilling should be put on the skin just behind the ear. where a hard bone ran be felt. It is often a relief to get a friend to drop water in the ear as hot as it can be borne. Starting with the water only warm and make it gradually hotter until the patient remarks that he does i not want to be boiled. Some sedative i drops may be put in the ear; they can be made by mixing equal parts of tincture

|of opium and olive oil. The drops •should be introduced into the ear with a teaspoon which has been dipped in boiling water. Bad Teeth and Swollen Joints. Here is something about joints which will probably be news to you. It was discovered that when joints were painful and swollen the presence of certain bacilli could be detected, and the puzzle was to find out where the bacilli came from, ami how they got to the joint. Wonderful to relate, the same microorganisms which were found in the joints were also found in the mouth jand around old stumps and decayed (teeth. It seemed to be a common-sense i treatment to cut off the supply of .germs by extracting the decayed teeth and gelling (hr ir.cuth in a thoroughly state; and when this was done 'too joints improved. The germs flour•irdn.ng .n a septic mouth are swallowed and absorbed into the blood stream, and una'iiv reach the joints, where they' start toe mischief. I implore you to keep your mouth sweet and clean. Have the Tooth Stopped. Do not be in a hurry to have an aehjing tooth out if it can be saved bv stopping. If you have a tooth taken j out of the lower jaw, you not only lose that tooth, but you put the corresponding tooth in the upper jaw hors de combat. You must have two millstones to grind the corn, and you must have an upper and a lower tooth to meet in order to masticate the food proper! v. I once knew an old lady who seemed to me to bp deprived of everything that

could make life worth living, and yet she continually wore a smile of contentment. One day 1 inquired of her what might be tile source of this contentment. and she said, “Well, doctor, it’s Ifiis way; I have only two teeth left in my head, but, thank goodness, | thev meet.’ -* She was a true philoso- ' pher. Simple Remedies. ! Try drinking quantities of water on : an empty stomach aa a cure for consti- ! pation. j Try sleeping with the window wide i open, with plenty of warm clothes on the bed, as a cure for anaemia and j drowsiness in the morning. , ! Try going to bed an hour earlier as a ' cure for backache and headache. Try eating very slowly indeed as a | cure for indigestion. • ! Try leading an unselfish life as a | means of beautifying your face.