Cases in which it is contra-indicated: endocarditis, pericarditis, meningitis, epi lepsy, eclampsia, chorea, acute diseases of the skin and certain chronic forms (as eczema, psoriasis, etc.), nodular rheuma tism, and the gouty diathesis. Jules Simon (Mcd. Age, July 25, '90).
Alcohol ought to be given very spar ingly, indeed, to people with chronic car diac disease, and one great consideration is that, having once begun to give it in such eases, it is very difficult, if not im possible, to leave it off. It is obnoxious in that it tends to diminish the desire for food, and perhaps may actually aggra vate the tendency to induration, arterial and valvular, which already exists. Al cohol should certainly be sparingly given. Sidney Coupland (Clinical Jour., Mar. 21, '94).
The condition of the system causes great variation in the physiological ef fects of alcohol. In convalescence from acute diseases, in the condition of shock from serious injury, loss of blood, or snake-bites, quantities which would, un der normal conditions, cause intoxica tion, are taken with impunity.
The extremes of life (infants and the aged) bear alcohol well. Habitual use modifies more decidedly the influence of alcohol on temperature, circulation, and the nervous system.
In the diseases of childhood all forms of gastrointestinal disturbance can he excluded from the list of diseases in which alcohol is beneficial. In acute cases, even in cholera infantum, large quantities of water with a small amount of black coffee or tea will stimulate better than alcohol, while it is not irritating to the already diseased mucous membrane.
It is especially irrational and harmful to administer alcohol in the diarrhceas of children before the stomach and bow els have been freed from all putrefying material.
In the typhoid fever of childhood Seibert rarely gives alcohol. The disease usually runs a mild course and relapses seldom occur if proper diet is adhered to. In pneumonia the enormous quantities of alcohol which are frequently given are irrational; they should only be used when collapse threatens or is present, and then in large doses and in concen trated form. Alcohol-fed children digest less perfectly in pneumonia than others, and do not regain their appetite and digestive power after the attack is over as those do who are treated without it.
Alcohol prepared in the form of pen cils, for the treatment of superficial im petigo, sycosis with small pustules, pustular acne, and pustular rosacea.
The patient carries the pencil with him, wrapped in tin-foil, and is instructed to rub it over the papules and pustules as frequently as possible. The formula for the pencils is as follows: B. Sodium stearate, 6 grammes. Glycerin, 25 grammes. Alcohol, 100 grammes.
The glycerin is added to prevent brit tleness. P. G. Unna (Monats. f. prakt. Dermat., xxxi, No. 11, 1900).