Electro-physiology and electro-therapeutics : showing the best methods for the medical uses of electricity / By Alfred C. Garratt.
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In treating all proper cases of contracted muscles, from what- ever cause, we find the law that electric currents run down- ward through the most palsied, atrophied, and contracted flexor muscles, for not more than a minute at a time, and then, allowing a recess of a few seconds, again applied running up- ward through the antagonizing muscles for a quarter minute, and thus reversed and alternated some half a dozen times at the sitting, as a general thing, has the best effects for dissolving all such curable contractions or tonus states of the muscle fibres, and gives the best results. This is proved, not only by the good result, but also, I think, from the opposite law, which is, that an up-running current, for one minute, that is then re- versed on the antagonizing muscles for a quarter minute, (so as here to run downward for only a quarter minute,) and then up again for one minute, and so on reversed and alternated for some time, can ultimately work up a state of tonic spasm. The conclusion that we should fix in our mind is, that the down- running current, that is maintained, say for a minute, running outward, from the brain and cord, towards the periphery and extremities, affects the sentient nerves of the part so acted upon more than the motory; and that the up-running current, that is, running towards the spinal cord and the brain, affects the motor nerves and muscles more profoundly than the sentient nerves, and that probably through reflex action. Incomplete paralysis of the lower extremities, according to the views of Dr. Spencer Wells, is often connected with diseases of the urinary organs, and may not be dependent on spinal disease. If a patient comes to you with a tottering gait, complaining of weakness in the knees, and a tendency to stumble on any uneven ground, exhibiting a certain loss of that muscular con- sciousness which enables us to walk without watching the feet to know where to place them at every step, your first impres- sion will be, very naturally, that you have to deal with a case of spinal disease. Your first impression may be correct. As you proceed with your examination of the case, you may find evidence of some kind of injury or disease about the spine, or possibly some proof that the disease is within the cranium.