Penicillin

Friday, November 4, 2011

NURSINF CARE is important for ensuring proper rest and sleep, for encouraging appetite and for maintaining adequate nutrition. There may be such sweating in the active stages necessitating sponging and frequent changes of clothing. For the same reason, extra fluids must be given. Posture in bed should be determined solely by the position of maximum comfort. Affected joints should also be supported in the most comfortable position. Cotton wool and bandages are usually sufficient for this purpose, but light splints may be required. In the acute stage a lead and opium lotion applied to the painful joints is soothing. Penicillin should be given for 7 to 10 days routinely at the start of treatment with the object of killing hemolytic streptococci in the nose and throat. It tonsillectomy is deemed to be necessary it should be carried out after the acute stage of the disease has subsided. Salicylates have long been used to combat fever and pain, and there is no doubt about their respect. However, there is little convincing evidence that they influence the important cardiac complications, or materially shorten the course of the disease. Nevertheless they add to the patient’s comfort and well being and it is difficult to believe that they can benefit the joints so markedly without influencing to some extent the other structures involved. In addition they are of some value in the differential diagnosis of polyarthritis.