The Eugenic Marriage, Volume IV | Page 5

and to the lungs of the child.
It may be caused by adenoids; disease of the bones or tissues in the nose; foreign bodies in the nose; or it may occur in children whose nutrition is bad. It may result from frequent acute attacks of "cold in the head." It also occurs in other less important conditions. The foreign bodies which usually cause a chronic nasal discharge are,--buttons, peas, beans, beads, paper balls, flies and bugs, cherry-stones, small pieces of coal, or stone, cork or other material. A child gets hold of a shoe-button for example and pushes it into its nostrils. In the effort to get it out the child pushes it further in. It may or may not cause pain at the time, and it may be overlooked, but shortly the mother will notice a discharge from one nostril. This discharge becomes thick and foul and when an investigation is made the button is found embedded firmly in the nose. It is sometimes quite difficult to get the button out and this should always be done by a physician.
Treatment.--Remove the cause first then treat the catarrh. If it is a product of a constitutional disease that causes general poor health, such as tuberculosis, syphilis, or scrofula, the child will need "building up" and a decided change of climate. Foreign bodies must be removed, adenoids taken out, large tonsils excised, and malformations of the nasal bones operated upon. The catarrh will in many cases be cured by removing its cause; if, however, it should persist it must be treated for some time with appropriate solutions. These solutions and the directions as to the method of giving them must be given by a physician, because there is great danger of carrying the disease to deeper structures if given wrongly.
SUMMARY:--
1st.--A chronic discharge from the nose is a sign that something is wrong and should be carefully and thoroughly investigated.
2nd.--The cause can usually be found out and the proper treatment will cure it.
3rd.--If the condition is neglected it may ruin the health of the child for the whole period of its life.
NERVOUS OR PERSISTENT COUGH
Cough in an infant or growing child is usually the result of a cold and the structure affected is some part of the nose, throat or bronchi. It is a comparatively simple matter to discover just where the trouble is and to prescribe the appropriate remedy and effect a cure.
There is another type of cough, however, that is of quite a different character. This cough will begin as an ordinary cough and it will only be discovered that it is not an ordinary cough because nothing will apparently cure it. We mean that the child is given cough remedies that usually cure a cold, is kept in the house and carefully watched for a sufficiently long period to justify a cure, and yet, despite this care and attention, the cough remains the same. The child is not sick, the appetite is good, there is no fever, it plays and seems to enjoy good health, yet for weeks and frequently for months the annoying cough hangs on. It is as a rule worse at night. It begins soon after the child falls asleep and spoils the entire night's rest or a great part of it. It may be a dry, hard, hacking cough, or a croupy, harsh bark. It may come in spells with a considerable interval between them, during which time the child falls asleep, or it may be almost constant, not quite severe enough to rouse the child, but bad enough to spoil the child's rest and the rest of the mother. If this condition lasts for a long time, as it occasionally does, the health of the little patient is apt to suffer from loss of sleep.
Treatment.--These children should be taken to a good physician and thoroughly examined. Special care should be devoted to investigating the condition of the nose, throat, ear, stomach, heart, and lungs.
A very large majority of these coughs are caused by adenoid growths in the back part of the nose. The child may not look like an adenoid child, nor may it breathe through its mouth when asleep, and it may have had its adenoids removed, yet in spite of these contra-indications it may have enough loose adenoid tissue in its nose to cause this kind of persistent cough. This has been proved many times.
It is not only useless but positively harmful to give these children cough remedies. The cause of the cough must be found and treated. The cough may be indirectly caused by anemia (poor blood) or heart or stomach trouble, or it may have a number of other causes. Whatever it is it must be found by a careful physical examination or a number of careful physical examinations, because these