Electro-physiology and electro-therapeutics : showing the best methods for the medical uses of electricity / By Alfred C. Garratt.

1 476 ELECTRO-THERAPEUTICS. of cases, such as where there is a contracted hip joint; so also for some aflec- tions of back, rectum, bladder, uterus, &c (See pages 280, 328, 430.) A. Note 2. A very small intensity current, such as that produced by the Humboldt battery, may be maintained continuously during the night, or even for days, with happy effects. So also the compound primary current of a Garratt's battery may be applied for 5,10, 15, 30, or 40 minutes at a time, and even for an hour or so, as in tetanus and convulsions, provided the power-coils are proportionally few, or the application is not near or about the head. But the powerful primary current of both quantity and intensity, such as produced by a DanielPs or a Smee's battery, has so much chemical effect in living (issues, that —although perfectly safe, and highly useful, when applied for given cases, and by a precise method, for only a fraction of a minute — we must ever be reminded that the long-continued application of such a current to the human organism is not safe, and is not its correct or philosophic use, but in all the minute details of current direction, whether this way or that, applies equally well for all the primary galvanic currents, as for all the secondary or Faradaic currents. B. Note 1. Experience leads me, of late, to conduct the electric treat- ment for most of the cases of neuralgia, rheumatism, " sciatica," and other pain-causing conditions of the nerves, muscles, and joints of the "lower limbs," — i. e. such as are not inflammatory, — under one of two general rules:— Rule 1. For Pains in the Lower Limbs. (Seepage 3G0.) — Where the painful limb is cold and soft, or lean, and with poor circulation, and particu- larly if the pain, stiffness, and weakness is about the hip and thigh, and mostly or only above or about the knee joint, — the foot and ankle being weak,—in all such cases apply the current in a direct or dotvn-running direction; always observing, in these cases, one other of my rules for neuralgic affections, viz. -. to commence the application with the utmost caution and gentleness in every possible respect; also using only large, fine, soft, and moist sponge electrodes, (see pages 328, 329,) one of which (the positive) is to be placed, according to the nature of the case, over the exit of the great sciatic nerve, or under the coccyx, or a little above the second lumbar vertebra, or else occasionally glided from the one place to the other, searching for the most tender spots, over and about which, when found, this electrode is to linger; and at the same time applying the other {negative) sponge into the popliteal space back of the knee joint, where it is to be held for, say, 30 or 60 seconds, with a gradually in- creasing current; then gliding it along, so as not to interrupt the current, on to the external peroneal nerve trunk, in like manner; then move it along over the extensor digitorum with a full bearable current; then wiping it over the whole calf of the leg for a minute or so more; then on to and about the outer ankle joint, and so on to the roots of the toes, first above, then under- neath, but without once intermitting or reversing the current. Here let this electrode rest; and now commence gliding the other, upper {positive) elec-