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Show WHAT NOT TO DO FOR SICK PEOPLE. <br><br> Don't make a fuss. Don't bustle, don't fidget, don't prognosticate. Don't hold consultations in or about the patients room, recounting all your own and your neighbors' experiences in what you suppose to have been like cases. Don't meddle and advise and experiment. We all need a great deal more letting alone than we get, and when we are sick it is one of our prime needs. If mortuary lists were honestly tabulated, we should find that more people have been bored to death than have died from neglect. The pest of the sick room is the inevitable friend who drops in to "cheer up" the patient, the glistening eyes and flushed cheeks which such ministrations evoke being hailed as evidences of success by the well-meaning persecutor. Don't tease the patient with questions about food or drink, but present the proper quantity at suitable intervals; and if one article is found to be disagreeable, quietly substitute another without remark. Don't think because the patient declines nourishment that it becomes less necessary to administer it. By quiet, firm, methodical, persistence in presenting food at stated periods, objections will become feebler, and cease in self defense. Solid food need not be insisted upon, unless by special direction of the physician; but milk and beef tea should never be omitted. Don't shut out the pure air and sunshine. The physician will exercise his skill in vain if wholesome food, pure air and peace do not abet his efforts. |