" Dr.
Armstrong goes on to mention six other instances within his knowledge, in
which the disease had at different times and places been limited, in the
same singular manner, to the practice of individuals, while it existed
scarcely if at all among the patients of others around them. Two of the
gentlemen became so convinced of their conveying the contagion, that they
withdrew for a time from practice.
I find a brief notice, in an American Journal, of another series of
cases, first mentioned by Mr. Davies, in the "Medical Repository." This
gentleman stated his conviction that the disease is contagious.
"In the autumn of 1822 he met with twelve cases, while his medical
friends in the neighborhood did not meet with any, 'or at least very
few.' He could attribute this circumstance to no other cause than his
having been present at the examination, after death, of two cases, some
time previous, and of his having imparted the disease to his patients,
notwithstanding every precaution."
Dr. Gooch says, "It is not uncommon for the greater number of cases to
occur in the practice of one man, whilst the other practitioners of the
neighborhood, who are not more skilful or more busy, meet with few or
none. A practitioner opened the body of a woman who had died of
puerperal fever, and continued to wear the same clothes. A lady whom he
delivered a few days afterwards was attacked with and died of a similar
disease; two more of his lying-in patients, in rapid succession, met with
the same fate; struck by the thought, that he might have carried
contagion in his clothes, he instantly changed them, and 'met with no
more cases of the kind.
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