Login:
 
A 150 years ago: How not to treat chronic rheumatoid arthritis. Practitioner September 2021;265(1851):29

A 150 years ago: How not to treat chronic rheumatoid arthritis

24 Sep 2021Registered users

I cannot too strongly protest against the therapeutic doctrine of ‘rest’ being so caricatured as to imprison a joint in splints for weeks or months at a time; the last hope of rescuing it from permanent uselessness may thus be destroyed. Intercurrent attacks of inflammation may peremptorily require a joint to be rested; to be placed for a few days on a back splint, to be poulticed, or even mildly blistered; but this is quite a different thing from putting it, whether inflamed or not, into a splint-case or box, and condemning it to a chronic fixed position.

Registered usersThis article can only be accessed if you are a registered user of thepractitioner.co.uk or a subscriber to The Practitioner.