The treatment of pulmonary consumption in special hospitals and dispensaries

Abstract

THERE is no doubt that the views of the inevitable charact~~r aud the incurability of pulmouary consumption are now altered, and it is admitted that phthisis is both preventable and curable. Although pu]monary consumption carries off, at ages between fifteen and forty-fivc, more than one-thivd of the people who die, and between fifteen and thirty-five nearly one-hatf, yet the ~ ...,4 ~, ~tegls~rar-uene~at s Reports show that in the last 30 years the annual rate of mortality from phthisis has been reduced by more than one-third. Notwithstanding this enormous death-rate, there is no eflicient machiners-at our disposal to e ope with ir.A very large proportion of the patients sufferiug from pulmonary consumption come from the poorer classes, and la I)ublia every dispensary is crowded with such cases: and I purpose very shortly to review the methods adopted in Dublin in dealing with such cases, and to inquire if those ~nethods are the best available.No feature in the modern treatment of consumption has received so much attention and deservedIy so as that which involves on the patieut residente abroad, and the literature on climatic treatment is large and exhaustŸ A sea voya ge or a winter in the south of France is reserved for rich people, and my remarks apply only to the treatmeut