[1]

THE
ELECTRIC BATH

ITS MEDICAL USES, EFFECTS
AND APPLIANCE

BY

GEORGE M. SCHWEIG, M.D.

MEMBER OF THE NEW YORK COUNTY MEDICAL SOCIETY AND OF THE MEDICAL
JOURNAL ASSOCIATION OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK; ONE OF THE
PHYSICIANS TO THE NEW YORK LYING-IN ASYLUM, ETC.

NEW YORK
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
182 FIFTH AVENUE
1877

[2]Copyright,
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS,
1876.

[3]

PREFACE.

In No 216 of “The Medical Record” (Dec. 15th,1874) was published an article written by me,entitled “On some of the Uses of Galvanic and FaradicBaths.”

The interest manifested in the subject, as evidencedby numerous letters of inquiry since receivedfrom physicians in almost all parts of the UnitedStates, and some in Europe, has induced me towrite the present treatise, in which I have endeavoredto present to the profession, as far as lies in mypower, all that is necessary to a full comprehensionof the electro-balneological treatment.

When it is considered that in the employmentof electric baths I have been to a great extent gropingin the dark, that I have been deprived of theadvantage of having the experience of others toguide me, it will not appear surprising that I shouldhave met with many disappointments. My failureshave been illustrative of the fact that the electricbath is no more a panacea for all ills than any[4]other remedial agent. Applicable as it is to a greatvariety of pathological conditions, it meets withmany where it is destined to have negative or atbest imperfect results. Far from discouraging me,however, failures have served to inspire me withfresh ardor to seek for light, and to persevere in myefforts to establish on the basis of statistical truth, thetherapeutic merits of the agent which I employed.

In view of the imperfectness of the results thusfar obtained, I should consider the present workpremature, did I not find a justification for it in mydesire to induce other and abler observers to investigatethe subject, and place it on whatever footingit may merit.

To say that I am fully conscious of the shortcomingsof my work, would be but feebly to expressmy convictions in this respect. I beg the readerhowever to consider that the subject is not a hackneyedone, that mine has not been the work of thecompiler who remodels the brain-work of others.It may be crude and rough, it may lack the glossand polish that is the result of much handling, butI have at least the consciousness that it has themerits of originality and candor.

New York.
160 Second Avenue. November, 1876.

[5]CONTENTS.