(continued from last message) Furuncle. See boil. Gangrene. Death and decay of tissue in a part of the body??usually a limb??due to injury, disease, or failure of blood supply. Synonym: mortification. Gleet. See catarrh. Gravel. A disease characterized by multiple small calculi (stones or concretions of mineral salts) which are formed in the kidneys, passed along the ureters to the bladder, and expelled with the urine. Synonym: kidney stone. Hectic fever. A daily recurring fever with profound sweating, chills, and flushed appearance?? often associated with pulmonary tuberculosis or septic poisoning. Hives. A skin eruption of wheals (smooth, slightly elevated areas on the skin) which is redder or paler than the surrounding skin. Often attended by severe itching, it usually changes its size or shape or disappears within a few hours. It is the dermal evidence of allergy. See the discussion under croup; also called cynanche trachealis. In the mid?nineteenth century, hives was a commonly given cause of death of children three years and under. Because true hives does not kill, croup was probably the actual cause of death in those children. Hospital fever. See typhus. Hydrocephalus. See dropsy. Hydrothorax. See dropsy. Icterus. See jaundice. Inanition. Exhaustion from lack of nourishment; starvation. A condition characterized by marked weakness, extreme weight loss, and a decrease in metabolism resulting from severe and prolonged (usually weeks to months) insufficiency of food. Infection. The affection or contamination of a person, organ, or wound with invading, multiplying, disease?producing germs??such as bacteria, rickettsiae, viruses, molds, yeasts, and protozoa. In the early part of the last century, infections were thought to be the propagation of disease by effluvia (see above) from patients crowded together. "Miasms" were believed to be substances which could not be seen in any form??emanations not apparent to the senses. Such miasms were understood to act by infection. Inflammation. Redness, swelling, pain, tenderness, heat, and disturbed function of an area of the body, especially as a reaction of tissue to injurious agents. This mechanism serves as a localized and protective response to injury. The word ending ?itis denotes inflammation on the part indicated by the word stem to which it is attached??that is, appendicitis, pleuritis, etc. Microscopically, it involves a complex series of events, including enlargement of the sizes of blood vessels; discharge of fluids, including plasma proteins; and migration of leukocytes (white blood cells) into the inflammatory focus. In the last century, cause of death often was listed as inflammation of a body organ??such as, brain or lung??but this was purely a descriptive term and is not helpful in identifying the actual underlying disease. Intussusception. The slipping of one part within another, as the prolapse of one part of the intestine into the lumen of an immediately adjoining part. This leads to obstruction and often must be relieved by surgery. Synonym: introsusception. Jail fever. See typhus. Jaundice. Yellow discoloration of the skin, whites of the eyes, and mucous membranes, due to an increase of bile pigments in the blood??often symptomatic of certain diseases, such as hepatitis, obstruction of the bile duct, or cancer of the liver. Synonym: icterus. Kidney stone. See gravel. Kings evil. A popular name for scrofula. The name originated in the time of Edward the Confessor, with the belief that the disease could be cured by the touch of the king of England. Lockjaw. Tetanus, a disease in which the jaws become firmly locked together. Synonyms: trismus, tetanus. Malignant fever. See typhus. Marasmus. Malnutrition occurring in infants and young children, caused by an insufficient intake of calories or protein and characterized by thinness, dry skin, poor muscle development, and irritability. In the mid?nineteenth century, specific causes were associated with specific ages: In infants under twelve months old, the causes were believed to be unsuitable food, chronic vomiting, chronic diarrhea, and inherited syphilis. Between one and three years, marasmus was associated with rickets or cancer. After the age of three years, caseous (cheeselike) enlargement of the mesenteric glands (located in the peritoneal fold attaching the small intestine to the body wall) became a given cause of wasting. (See tabes mesenterica.) After the sixth year, chronic pulmonary tuberculosis appeared to be the major cause. Marasmus is now considered to be related to kwashiorkor, a severe protein deficiency. Meningitis. Inflammation of the meninges (the three membranes covering the brain and spinal cord), especially of the pia mater and arachnoid??caused by a bacterial or viral infection and characterized high fever, severe headache, and stiff neck or back muscles. Synonym: brain fever. Morbus. Latin word for disease. In the last century, when applied to a particular disease, morbus was associated with some qualifying adjective or noun, indicating the nature or seat of such disease. Examples: morbus cordis, heart disease; morbus caducus, epilepsy or failing sickness. Neuralgia. Sharp and paroxysmal pain along the course of a sensory nerve. There are many causes: anemia, diabetes, gout, malaria, syphilis. Many varieties of neuralgia are distinguished according to the part affected??such as face, arm, leg. Paristhmitis. See quinsy. Petechial fever. See typhus. Phthisis. See consumption. Pleurisy. Inflammation of the pleura, the membranous sac lining the chest cavity, with or without fluid collected in the pleural cavity. Symptoms are chills, fever, dry cough, and pain in the affected side (a stitch). Pneumonia. Inflammation of the lungs with congestion or consolidation???caused by viruses, bacteria, or physical and chemical agents. Pus. A yellow?white, more or less viscid substance found in abscesses and sores, consisting of a liquid plasma in which white blood cells are formed and suspended by the process of inflammation. Putrid fever. See typhus. Putrid sore throat. Ulceration of an acute form, attacking the tonsils and rapidly running into sloughing of the fauces (the cavity at the back of the mouth, leading to the pharynx). Pyrexia. See dysentery. Quinsy. A fever, or a febrile condition. An acute inflammation of the tonsils, often leading to an abscess; peritonsillar abscess. Synonyms: suppurative tonsillitis, cynanche tonsillaris, paristhmitis, sore throat. Scarlatina. Scarlet fever. A contagious febrile disease, caused by infection with the bacteria group. A beta?hemolytic streptococci (which elaborate a toxin with an affinity for red blood cells) and characterized by a scarlet eruption, tonsillitis, and pharyngitis. Scrofula. Primary tuberculosis of the lymphatic glands, especially those in the neck. A disease of children and young adults, it represents a direct extension of tuberculosis into the skin from underlying lymph nodes. It evolves into cold abscesses, multiple skin ulcers, and draining sinus tracts. Synonym: king's evil. Septic. Infected, a condition of local or generalized invasion of the body by disease?causing microorganisms (germs) or their toxins. Ship fever. See typhus. Spotted fever. See typhus. Suffocation. The stoppage of respiration. In the nineteenth century, suffocation was reported as being accidental or homicidal. The accidents could be by the impaction of pieces of food or other obstacles in the pharynx or by the entry of foreign bodies into the larynx (as a seed, coin, or food). Suffocation of newborn children by smothering under bedclothes may have happened from carelessness as well as from intent. However, the deaths also could have been due to SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome), wherein the sudden and unexpected death of an apparently healthy infant, while asleep, typically occurs between the ages of three weeks and five months and is not explained by careful postmortem studies. Synonyms of SIDS: crib death and cot death. It was felt that victims of homicidal suffocation were chiefly infants or feeble and infirm persons. Summer complaint. See cholera infantum. Suppuration. The production of pus. Tabes mesenterica. Tuberculosis of the mesenteric glands in children, resulting in digestive derangement and wasting of the body. Teething. The entire process which results in the eruption of the teeth. Nineteenth?century medical reports stated that infants were more prone to disease at the time of teething. Symptoms were restlessness, fretfulness, convulsions, diarrhea, and painful and swollen gums. The latter could be relieved by lancing over the protruding tooth. Often teething was reported as a cause of death in infants. Perhaps they became susceptible to infections, especially if lancing was performed without antisepsis. Another explanation of teething as a cause of death is that infants were often weaned at the time of teething; perhaps they then died from drinking contaminated milk, leading to an infection, or from malnutrition if watered?down milk was given. Tetanus. An infectious, often?fatal disease caused by a specific bacterium, Clostridium tetani, that enters the body through wounds; characterized by respiratory paralysis and tonic spasms and rigidity of the voluntary muscles, especially those of the neck and lower jaw. Synonyms: trismus, lockjaw. Thrush. A disease characterized by whitish spots and ulcers on the membranes of the mouth, tongue, and fauces caused by a parasitic fungus, Candida albicans. Thrush usually affects sick, weak infants and elderly individuals in poor health. Now it is a common complication from excessive use of broad?spectrum antibiotics or cortisone treatment. Synonyms: aphthae, sore mouth, aphthous stomatitis. Trismus nascentium or neonatorum. A form of tetanus seen only in infants, almost invariably in the first five days of life, probably due to infection of the umbilical stump. Typhoid fever An infectious, often?fatal, febrile disease, usually occurring in the summer months??characterized by intestinal inflammation and ulceration caused by the bacterium Salmonella typhi, which is usually introduced by food or drink. Symptoms include prolonged hectic fever, malaise, transient characteristic skin rash (rose spots), abdominal pain, enlarged spleen, slowness of heart rate, delirium, and low white?blood cell count. The name came from the disease's similarity to typhus (see below). Synonym: enteric fever. Typhus. An acute, infectious disease caused by several micro?organism species of Rickettsia (transmitted by lice and fleas) and characterized by acute prostration, high fever, depression, delirium, headache, and a peculiar eruption of reddish spots on the body. The epidemic or classic form is louse borne; the endemic or murine is flea borne. Synonyms: typhus fever, malignant fever (in the 1850s), jail fever, hospital fever, ship fever, putrid fever, brain fever, bilious fever, spotted fever, petechial fever, camp fever. Virus. An ultramicroscopic, metabolically inert infectious agent that replicates only within the cells of living hosts, mainly bacteria, plants, and animals. In the early 1800s virus meant poison, venom, or contagion. Yellow fever. An acute, often?fatal, infectious febrile disease of warm climates??caused by a virus transmitted by mosquitoes, especially Aledes aegypti, and characterized by liver damage and jaundice, fever, and protein in the urine. In 1900 Walter Reed and others in Panama found that mosquitoes transmit the disease. Clinicians in. the late nineteenth century recognized "specific yellow fever" as being different from "malarious yellow fever." The latter supposedly was a form of malaria with liver involvement but without urine involvement. NOTES AND REFERENCES William Cullen, First Lines of the Practice of Physic with Practical and Explanatory Notes by John Rotheram (New York: Evert Duyckinck, 1801 ); Robert Hooper, Lexicon?Medicum or Medical Dictionary (New York: J. & J. Harper, 1826); Marshall Hail, The Principles of Diagnosis (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1835); Robley Dunglison, A Dictionary of Medical Science, Containing a Concise Account of the Various Subjects and Terms (Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, 1844); Richard D. Hoblyn, A Dictionary of Terms Used in Medicine and the Collateral Sciences (Philadelphia: Henry C. Lea, 1865); William Aitken, The Science and Practice of Medicine, 2 vols. (Philadelphia: Lindsay & Blakiston, 1872); Richard Quain, ed., A Dictionary of Medicine (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1883); Austin Flint, A Treatise on the Principles and Practice of Medicine (Philadelphia: Henry C. Lea's Son & Co., 1884); George M. Gould, An Illustrated Dictionary of Medicine, Biology, and Allied Sciences (Philadelphia: P. Blakiston's Son & Co., 1901); Glentworth Reeve Butler, The Diagnostics of Internal Medicine (New York and London: D. Appleton and Company, 1903); The Random House Dictionary of the English Language, 2d ed., unabridged (New York: Random House, 1987); Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary (Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders Co., 1988). From the article "Disease and Death in the Nineteenth Century: A Genealogical Perspective", by James Byars Carter, M.D. Exerpted from a complete article on the subject from The National Genealogical Society Quarterly, Vol. 76, (Dec 1988) pp 289?301.