Lectures on aural catarrh, or, the commonest forms of deafness and their cure (mostly delivered at St. Man's Hospital)

Front matter

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DEPOSITED IN THE

boston Medical Imum,

Preface

There has not been, so far as I am aware, any new separate work, however limited in design, published in this country upon Aural Disease, since that of Me. Toynbee, in the year 1860. It is obvious that the following Lectures do not pretend to be an exhaustive treatise upon their subject, which though it might at first sight appear to be confined within moderate limits, is in reality of very wide extent. I have, however, been anxious that this contribution to a most important department of

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study should have a certain completeness in itself, and should, whatever its many faults or deficiencies, embody in some degree the ideas fully established in my own mind, of the system essentially necessary to be pursued in striving to advance our scientific knowledge. This point (of system), appears to me to have been frequently lost sight of in some of the most esteemed and elaborate works on Aural Surgery and Medicine, with the consequence of (to say the least) impairing their usefulness to the young student. Nor has the busy practitioner the time to search and sift among endless records of cases, ranged under multitudinous classes, from the mass of which it is often a task of extreme difficulty to obtain any assured clue for his own guidance. I have, accordingly taken considerable pains in the construction of what may be called the groundplan of the ensuing short series of Lectures ; and not to be further tedious. I now con-

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elude, by expressing nay hope that they will be found by any earnest reader, of some genuine help, in telling him how to examine, what to look for, and where to find the disease, in a case of Aural Catarrh.

P. ALLEN,

15, Savile Row,

CONTENTS,

LECTURE I.

Introductory. — Subject of the lectures. Frequency with which aural catarrh originates in the throat. Parts affected in this disease. Neglect of aural surgery. St. Mary's Hospital the first to establish special instruction for students. Labours of Toynbee and others. Diseases of the external and internal ear not under consideration in these lectures. Middle ear, including the membrana tympani, the region most commonly affected in aural catarrh. Membrana tympani belongs to external as well as middle division of the ear. Importance of ocular inspection under all circumstances. Two cases in illustration. Remarks upon them . 1 — 17

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