Old Time Illnesses

When I was going through the vital records and recording the deaths, two of the illnesses that were commonly put down for cause of death were Consumption and Dropsy. There were a couple of others also, but appeared to be related to the doctor at the time. Some of the doctors appeared to have fairly consistent causes of death from one person to the other.

Dropsy: I remember my grandmother identifying mainly women with dropsy. They had huge legs that appeared to be filled with fluid and their ankles actually seemed to flow over their shoes. The Internet describes Dropsy as: An old term for the swelling of soft tissues due to the accumulation of excess water.

In years gone by, a person might have been said to have dropsy. Today one would be more descriptive and specify the cause. Thus, the person might have edema due to congestive heart failure.

Consumption was also another common medical term in the old days and the Internet describes it as follows:

Consumption: An old and once common term for wasting away of the body, particularly from pulmonary tuberculosis (TB). Other old TB terms include the King's evil or scrofula (TB of the lymph nodes in the neck) and Pott's disease (TB of the spine).