A guide to the treatment of diseases of the skin : with suggestions for their prevention for the use of the student and general practitioner / by Thomas Hunt.

  • Hunt, Thomas, 1798-1879.
Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A guide to the treatment of diseases of the skin : with suggestions for their prevention for the use of the student and general practitioner / by Thomas Hunt. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    tarrhs, rheumatism, and gout. Between the warm bath and the cold there is little to choose. The poor generally prefer the former, which is certainly better adapted for cleansing the skin. But it should be taken late in the evening, and the bather wrapped m a warm garment should walk briskly home to his bed. This will generally prevent his taking a chill, the only objection to a warm bath. Nor can I for- bear suggesting two improvements much required in most of our public baths. 1. The bather naturally reduces the temperature of his bath by the compara- tive coldness of the surface of his body, and the evap- oration from the surface of the water still further cools it. But it is highly desirable that when he leaves the bath the water should be some ten degrees warmer than when he enters it; whereas it is apt to be at least fifteen degrees colder. Therefore he should either be furnished with means to add hot water when he wishes to do so, and be admonished accordingly; or the attendant should at the rio-ht time, turn on the hot water for him. 2. The evapor- ation is unnecessarily promoted by a very common arrangement, by which the bath being opened at the top, the bather is exposed to the common atmosphere of a large portion of the building, an atmosphere al- ways much colder, and in winter very many decrees colder than the water. The result is, that the water is not only speedily cooled, but the bather gets chilled m dressing, and often takes a catarrh. And this talcing cold is so common, that it forms the chief objection alleged by the poor against bathing. Whereas if the bath were closed at the top, as are the private baths, and the bather dressed himself