Chapter XXXIII: How Consumption Is Cured

[Sidenote: Consumption should be recognized early]

When people first get consumption, they seldom realize that they are seriously sick. Most of them think they have a bad cold, or are overworked, or that they have been staying too closely in the house. Often they will not even see a doctor until they are so sick that the doctor cannot do much for them.

When you have a slight cough that "hangs on"; when you feel feverish every afternoon; when you are short of breath; when you get tired very easily; when you do not feel like eating anything except candies and cakes--then you should think of consumption. These are not all the signs, but they are enough to make you go at once to a doctor.

A long time ago the doctor would have felt badly if he had been obliged to tell you that you had consumption; but now he knows that if you go to him early in the disease and follow his directions, you will get well.

[Sidenote: How consumption is cured: (_1_) By rest]

When the doctor finds that a person has consumption, the first thing he orders is rest. By this he means absolute _rest_. He does not mean that the patient can go to school or to the office part of the day and rest the remainder of the day. The doctor will want to watch him constantly. Then there comes a time when he must begin to take a little exercise; the doctor tells him just how much exercise to take, and just what form of exercise is best for him.

[Sidenote: (_2_) By fresh air]

The consumptive must have plenty of fresh air all the time; he must be out-of-doors as much as possible. You will wonder how the doctor expects him to be out-of-doors when he has been told that he must have absolute rest. Later we will show you how one can practically be out-of-doors and yet at the same time be in bed.

[Sidenote: (_3_) By sunshine]

Sunshine will kill the germs of any disease more quickly than almost anything we know of, and a consumptive must have all the sunshine that he can get. Of course it cannot get into the body to kill the germs, but it strengthens the cells of the body so much that they can fight with just that much more energy.

[Sidenote: (_4_) By nourishing food]

Nothing is more important than pure food in building up the body and in making heat and power. In consumption the food that is stored up in the body burns itself up very fast. The consumptive must therefore take not only the food needed to supply the usual demands of the body, but enough to make something extra for the disease to burn up without drawing on the reserve fund stored in the body. In order to do this, he will have to eat a great deal, and what he eats must be of the kind that makes the best building material and the most nourishing material. He cannot tax his stomach by eating things that are not nourishing; all the work his stomach can do must be devoted to the foods he really needs.

The weapons with which we fight consumption are rest, good food, fresh air, and sunshine. These will do more good than all the medicine in the world. Fresh air is not only one of the best things for the cure of consumption, but it is one of the best things for the prevention of consumption. You should always breathe plenty of fresh air night and day, and there is plenty of fresh air to be had if you will take it.

[Sidenote: How to have fresh air at home:]

If you have only a single window in your room, try to sleep with your head in the fresh air. It is not always easy to arrange a room in such a way that you can have fresh air without placing your bed in a draft, but even this difficulty can be overcome.

[Sidenote: (_1_) By window tents]

There are several devices, called window tents, which you can buy. By the use of such a tent, your head will be out-of-doors all the time; yet the draft cannot strike your body, because a part of the tent fits around your neck and cuts off the air from the rest of your body. One of these tents is shown in Figure 74. You do not put your head out of the window; your head is on your pillow just as if the tent were not there. Your bed is placed directly in front of the window and the tent comes down over your pillow, allowing your head practically to be out-of-doors, but keeping the cold air out of the room. Sleeping under a window tent is the next best thing to sleeping out-of-doors.

[Sidenote: (_2_) By sleeping porches]

Many of our modern houses are built with sleeping porches on which one can sleep outdoors summer and winter. Where there is not a special sleeping porch on the house, an ordinary porch may often be made to serve the purpose, or a very inexpensive sleeping porch can be added to the house.

[Sidenote: (_3_) By tent cots]

Sometimes people cannot get the use of a porch of any kind. In such cases it may be possible to put up a tent in the yard. If the yard is very small, a tent cot may be used. This is simply a cot with a tent on it, which can be closed up and put away in the daytime and set up again at night. In a large city where the houses have no yards at all, this arrangement can be used by setting it up on the roof of the house. There is almost always some way of securing fresh air at night if we will only give a little thought to the matter.

[Sidenote: Fresh air in schoolrooms]

Unfortunately, many of our school buildings are not provided with good ventilating plants. A proper system of ventilation furnishes at least 1200 cubic feet of fresh air per hour for each child in each room.

[Sidenote: The necessity for playgrounds]

In large cities it is often impossible to find outdoor space in which boys and girls may play during recess. Even this difficulty can be overcome by turning the roof of the school building into a playground, with a high wire netting around it.

Every school yard should be provided with swings, bars, and gymnasium apparatus to encourage the children to take plenty of exercise. Children who live in crowded towns need exercise during vacation as well as during school days, and the school yards should be open to them at all times. A summer teacher who shows the children the best way to exercise, has work fully as important as that of any other teacher during the school term.

A sound body is more valuable than education itself, but a good education and a sound body together are the best assets any man or woman can have.

=Questions.= 1. State the four things necessary to cure
consumption; show the value of each. 2. What is the value of
fresh air to every one? 3. How may an abundance of fresh air be
secured in the home? 4. In the school?

=Remember.= 1. Rest, fresh air, sunshine, and nourishing food
are the cures for consumption. 2. All these things can be
secured in any climate and by every person. 3. =Tuberculosis is
a communicable disease.= 4. =Tuberculosis can be prevented.= 5.
=Tuberculosis can be cured.=