Observations placeholder

As described in Illustrations Of The Influence Of The Mind Upon The Body In Health And Disease, Designed To Elucidate The Action Of The Imagination - Daniel Hack Tuke, M.D., M.R.C.P.,

PART I. THE INTELLECT.
CHAPTER V. INFLUENCE OF THE INTELLECT UPON THE ORGANIC OR VEGETATIVE FUNCTIONS.

…..we may refer here to what is called a " bilious headache " when brought on by overwork at the desk. Any one given to study can trace such an attack from its earliest stage. Dr. Latham, of Cambridge, in a Clinical Lecture on Nervous or Sick-headaches (British Medical Journal, March 23d, 1872), states that he meets with a great many cases (sufficiently severe to require treatment) both in males and females, but " perhaps in a university town, owing to the large proportion of individuals of studious and sedentary habits, it may be more prevalent among males than in other places."

The attacks he refers to were brought on by "prolonged mental work, protracted mental excitement, or any intense strain on the feelings." That the attack may come on during actual work, and be arrested by suspending mental application, we have ample evidence to prove. It is, however, true that, if there is actual mental excitement, "the attack may not be developed during the paroxysm, but afterwards, when the excitement has passed off, and the mental strain is somewhat lessened."

He marks two stages, one of disordered sensation, including glimmering, spectral forms, and other signs of visual derangement, tingling in some portion of the body, as the arm or one side of the tongue, affections of hearing and (involving the motor centres) speech, and loss of power over the facial muscles ; the other of headache and nausea, which so often occur with the sensorial disturbances, the chief symptoms being cold feet, restlessness, and the localized, more or less piercing pain felt in the head, especially (so far as our observation goes) over the left eyebrow.

Dr. Latham's cases were generally marked by anaemia, a relaxed condition of the muscles and arteries ; the pulse small and compressible, often slow, but accelerated on slight exertion ; the general tone of the system, in short, being lowered. The headache he considers explained by the contraction of the cerebral vessels in the first instance, being followed by their dilatation ; the vaso-motor nerves of the sympathetic being first excited, and then exhausted.