Cases of Itch

74 Old people have especially dry itch, and if this is driven off by external applications, usually quartan fever ensues, which vanishes as soon as the itch re-appears on the skin.

75 A count, 57 years old, had suffered for 3 years of dry itch.

It was driven off, and he enjoyed for two years an apparently good health, only he had during this time two attacks of vertigo, which gradually so increased that once after finishing his meal he was seized with such vertigo that he would have fallen to the floor if he had not been supported.

He was covered with an icy perspiration, his limbs trembled, all the parts of his body were as dead, and he repeatedly vomited up a sour substance.

A similar attack followed six weeks later, then once a month for three months. He indeed retained consciousness, but there always followed heaviness of the head and a drunken stupor. At last these attacks came daily, though in a milder form. He could not read, nor think, nor turn around quickly, nor stoop down. This was attended with sadness, sorrowful, anxious thoughts and sighs.

76 A 36 year old woman had the itch driven from the skin a few years before with mercurial remedies. Her menses became irregular, and were often interrupted for ten or even fifteen weeks; she was at the same time constipated.

Four years ago during pregnancy she was seized with vertigo, and she would suddenly fall down while standing or walking. While sitting she would retain her senses during the vertigo and could speak, eat and drink. At her first attack she felt in her left foot, as it were, a crawling sensation and formication, which terminated in a violent jerking up and down of the feet. In time these attacks took away consciousness, and afterwards, in traveling in a carriage, there came an attack of real epilepsy, which returned thrice in the following winter.

During these attacks she could not speak; she did not, indeed, turn her thumbs inward, but yet there was foam at her mouth. The sensation of formication in the left foot announced the attack, and when this sensation reached the pit of the stomach it suddenly brought on the fit This epilepsy was removed by a woman with five powders, but instead of it her vertigo re-appeared, but much more violently than before.

It also commenced with a crawling sensation in the left foot, which rose up to the heart; this was attended with great anxiety and fear, as if she were falling down from a height, and while supposing that she had fallen she lost consciousuess and speech; at the same time her limbs moved convulsively. But, also, outside of these attacks the least touch of her feet caused her the most intense pain, as if from a boil. This was attended with severe pains and heat in the head and with loss of memory.

Convulsions, Juncker, as ab. tab., 53. Hoechstetter, Eph. Nat. Cur. Dec. 8, Cas. 3. Eph. nat. cur. dec. 2, ann. obs. 35, and ann. 5, obs. 224. D. W. Triller. Welle, Diss. nullam medicinam interdum esse optimam, Viteb., 1754, § 13, 14.77 Sicelius, Decas Casuum I., Cas. 5.78 Pelargus, as ab., Jahrg., 1723, p. 545.79.

77 After an itch driven away by ointment there followed, with a girl, a most profound swoon, and soon after the most terrible convulsions and death.

78 A girl of 17, in consequence of tinea capitis which disappeared of itself, was seized with continual heat in the head and attacks of headache. She sometimes suddenly started up as if from fright, and while awake she was seized with convulsive motions of the limbs, especially of the arms and hands, as also with oppression in the pit of the stomach, as if her breast was laced together, with moaning; then her limbs would jerk convulsively and she would start up.

79 A full-grown man who had been for some time affected with tremor of the hands had his tinea dry up. He was thereupon seized with great lassitude and red patches, without heat, broke out on his body. The tremor passed over into convulsive shaking, , bloody matter was discharged from his nose and his ears, he also coughed up blood, and he died on 23d day amidst convulsions.

80 A man who had driven off a frequently occurring eruption of itch with an ointment fell into epileptic convulsions, which disappeared again when the eruption re-appeared on the skin.

81 A youth of 18 years drove off the itch with a mercurial ointment and two months after he was unexpectedly seized with convulsions, which attacked all the limbs of the body, now this, now that, with painful constriction of the breast and the neck, coldness of the limbs and great weakness. The fourth day he was seized with epilepsy, foaming at the mouth, while the limbs were strangely contorted. The epilepsy only yielded when the eruption returned.

82 With a boy, whose tinea had been driven off by rubbing it with almond oil.

83 With children, combined with suffocating catarrh.

84 A servant girl after twice rubbing her itch with ointment had an attack of epilepsy.

85 A youth of 18, who had driven out itch with mercurial remedies, was seized a few weeks later with epilepsy, which returned after four weeks with the new moon.