33

CHAP. V.

CONSIDERATIONS RESPECTING THE MEANS OF CURE 56

AN ESSAY ON THE SHAKING PALSY.

CHAPTER I.

DEFINITION--HISTORY--ILLUSTRATIVE CASES.

SHAKING PALSY. (_Paralysis Agitans._)

Involuntary tremulous motion, with lessened muscular power,
in parts not in action and even when supported; with a
propensity to bend the trunk forwards, and to pass from a
walking to a running pace: the senses and intellects being
uninjured.

The term Shaking Palsy has been vaguely employed by medical writers in
general. By some it has been used to designate ordinary cases of
Palsy, in which some slight tremblings have occurred; whilst by others
it has been applied to certain anomalous affections, not belonging to
Palsy.

The shaking of the limbs belonging to this disease was particularly
noticed, as will be seen when treating of the symptoms, by Galen, who
marked its peculiar character by an appropriate term. The same
symptom, it will also be seen, was accurately treated of by Sylvius de
la Boe. Juncker also seems to have referred to this symptom: having
divided tremor into active and passive, he says of the latter, "ad
affectus semiparalyticos pertinent; de qualibus hic agimus, quique
_tremores paralytoidei_ vocantur." Tremor has been adopted, as a
genus, by almost every nosologist; but always unmarked, in their
several definitions, by such characters as would embrace this disease.
The celebrated Cullen, with his accustomed accuracy observes,
"Tremorem, utpote semper symptomaticum, in numerum generum recipere
nollem; species autem a Sauvagesio recensitas, prout mihi vel astheniae
vel paralysios, vel convulsionis symptomata esse videntur, his
subjungam[1]." Tremor can indeed only be considered as a symptom,
although several species of it must be admitted. In the present
instance, the agitation produced by the peculiar species of tremor,
which here occurs, is chosen to furnish the epithet by which this
species of Palsy, may be distinguished.

[Footnote 1: Synopsis Nosologiae Methodicae.--Tom. ii. p. 195.]

HISTORY.

So slight and nearly imperceptible are the first inroads of this
malady, and so extremely slow is its progress, that it rarely happens,
that the patient can form any recollection of the precise period of
its commenceme