Injuries of nerves and their consequences - Reflex Sympathetic ...

TREATMENT. 249
the treat-
store functional health. Before commencing
ment of such cases, I am always careful to measure the
size of the limb, since a change in its bulk and warmth
often precedes the return of irritability, and may lead us
to a hopeful continuance of the treatment.
It is, in many cases, advisable to interrupt the electric
treatment for a month, after it has been continued for
two or three months. When, during the treatment,
neuralgia comes on, it is also requisite to pause for
awhile, or to make the sittings less frequent, when the
pain, which is far from an unfavorable sign, will disappear.
In bad cases, I have been in the habit of heating the
part before the sitting, and even of keeping
it in hot
water during the use of the conductors, since I have frequently
observed that Avhen a palsied part
is well warmed
it reacts much more readily to all forms of stimulus,
whether volitional or electric.
For faradising insensible surfaces, I use the ordinary
Duchenne brush of very tine wires, carried lightly over
the skin, which has been previously dried and dusted with
flour,* while one wet conductor remains pressed on the
surface an inch or two distant. For this purpose the
secondary current is needed. f
Manipukdion.— For want of a better name I have here
styled manipulation what is known as shampooing, rubbing,
massage,
etc. Its value in the treatment of all
forms of traumatic, and, indeed, of some other palsies,
is very great, and the results which I have seen obtained
by practiced rubbers were certain to be Ij^ gained by no
other equally rapid treatment.
* Duchenne.
f Until lately, we possessed no good batteries of American make. Those
manufactured bj' the Galvano-Faradic Company of New York have
amply supplied this want, and are in all respects equal, and in some ways
superior, to any of the foreign instruments.
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