Student lecture notes on the Theory & Practice of Physic, and patient case histories, of Lyman Spalding, 1795-1799 (inclusive)

Contains notes taken by Harvard student Lyman Spalding from lectures delivered by Hersey Professor of the Theory and Practice of Physic Benjamin Waterhouse (1754-1846) in 1795. The notes cover the history of medicine, theories of contemporary physicians like Herman Boerhaave, William Cullen, and John Brown, and topics like fetal growth, digestion, and circulation. The volume also contains six pages of patient case notes from Spalding’s medical practice in Walpole, New Hampshire, in 1799, which detail the patients’ symptoms and course of treatment he pursued. In the case of a young man who complained of pain in his breast following a wrestling match, Spalding bled him and prescribed a cathartic of soap and aloes. Spalding also operated on a man who cut off part of his ankle with an ax.

Titled devised by cataloger.

Student lecture notes on the Theory & Practice of Physic, and patient case histories, of Lyman Spalding, 1795-1799 (inclusive). B MS b18.4. Boston Medical Library, Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Boston, Mass.

Lyman Spalding (1775-1821), M.B., 1797, Harvard College, Cambridge, Massachusetts, practiced medicine in New Hampshire and New York. He was noted for his work in smallpox vaccination, treatment of yellow fever, and study of anatomy. Spalding taught chemistry at Dartmouth Medical School and Fairfield Medical School for several years. He founded the Pharmacopoeia of the United States of America.