searching for tb treatment in 1941

Where? While treatments were similar in many countries, where can make a lot of difference.

GP
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2006 NaNo winner - Berlin, Witnesses at the Crossroads of History, Book I
2007 NaNo winner - Berlin, Witnesses at the Crossroads of History, Book II
2008 NaNo winner - Berlin, Witnesses at the Crossroads of History, Book III
2009 -

The first TB antibiotic was discovered early 1940's, so there wouldn't have been any drugs to treat your poor lady at that time. I believe the medical profession (England at least) was still sending people to sanatoria at that time - hospitals where patients were given a good diet (doctors knew nutrition was really important for TB, especially as sufferers lose so much weight) and were given daily fresh air/sun bathing (this really does help!). The hospitals were purpose built to get sun all year round and had lots of windows to keep them airy! Hygiene would have been taken very seriously and pasturisation of milk had just come in to stop TB from being spread from cows to humans (in UK).

Surgical treatment to chop out infected bits of the lungs wasn't used properly until decent anaesthetics were introduced (1950s). Instead, they might have tried a procedure called the pneumothorax technique - this involved collapsing the lung to let the lesions heal although it didn't work well.
From wiki:
Recurrent or persistent pneumothorax
The simplest and earliest procedure was to introduce air into the pleural space so as to collapse the affected lung and therefore the open cavity. There was always spontaneous resolution of the pneumothorax and the procedure had to be repeated every few weeks.
Phrenic nerve crush
The phrenic nerve (which supplies the diaphragm) was cut or crushed so as to permanently paralyse the diaphragm on that side. The paralysed diaphragm would then rise up and the lung on that side would collapse, thus closing the cavity.
Thoracoplasty
When the cavity was located in the apex of the lung, thoracoplasty could be performed. Six to eight ribs were broken and pushed into the thoracic cavity to collapse the lung beneath. This was a disfiguring operation, but it avoided the need for repeated procedures.
Plombage
Plombage reduced the need for a disfiguring operation. It involved inserting porcelain balls into the thoracic cavity to collapse the lung underneath.

I get the feeling that there wasn't a whole lot of treatment other than rest, fresh air, and a good diet. My great-grandmother had TB and spent a lot of time in and out of sanatoriums. Here is a website that has a lot of personal testimonies about life in a sanatoriumL http://www.mayburysanatorium.com/

Probably in the southeastern part of us - south carolina

thanks for the reply

thanks,
that is very interesting information. i so far have seen mostly bedrest, are they contagious at any time?

i'm not sure this poor lady will need surgury. we caught it early (if you can catch tb early).

thanks for the info.

i'll check out the website. the only sanatorium info i could find earlier, which was limited, didn't explain too much about the care.

how long was your great-grandmother in the sanatorium? did she survive?

sorry to be so nosey. but would be helpful

In the USA it was mandatory for TB patients to go to the sanatorium. Not because they would all get better there, but because that was the most effective way to prevent them infecting healthy members of the family & community.

gastropod

A person is contagious if they are coughing - the main symptom of TB. About half of people with TB would die without drugs!

She had been suffering from TB for all her adult life, and was in and out of hospitals during that time. She didn't live very long--she died in 1946 when she was 36 years old. Interestingly, my grandmother, her daughter, still tests positive for TB because she was in such close contact with a TB patient for such a long time.

This is interesting. I live in South Carolina, and just outside of Columbia (in State Park) is the old TB Sanitorium. After they stopped using it for that, it became a hospital, and is now abandoned. The SC Department of Health has an interesting powerpoint about it, it's full of good information, both local and general.

Here is a timeline:
http://www.scdhec.gov/administration/history/timeline.htm

Here is the powerpoint:
https://sntc.medicine.ufl.edu/Files/OnTheFly/Content/16%20-%20Hist%20of%...

A note on the name: the area is called State Park, and it is a suburb of Columbia. Around the actual sanitorium are lots of houses for doctors, etc., as well as two outbuildings in the back (I'm not sure about their use, but they appear to be roughly the same age as the main building), and a water tower. If you go to google maps or google earth, you should be able to find it by typing in State Park, SC.

I find that place fascinating. Good luck with your novel!

Kalla

thanks,

i haven't seen anything about mandatory treatment for tb in my research yet. would that have applied to the 1940's?

thanks,
she hasn't had much coughing, yet, but i will have to do a lot of rewriting with all my new information.

it seems to me that a lot of people had tb or consumption over the years and that they either were not diagnosed with tb or just lived with it at home. and not all of them died who were exposed. is there any reason, you think, that some of the people are immune? better hygiene??

thanks,
everyone has had such good information on tb in the 1940's, i have spent all of today just making notes.

thank you for the web sites, i will check them out.

i am setting my story in spartenburg, sc and columbia is about 80 miles south of that i think. so if she has to go to a sanitorium that would be a long distance in 1940. i may have to write just fiction, not historical fiction.

we just spent 3 months with my sister just outside of spartenburg this summer on an old farm. really helped me in this story. i just hope i can get it all together after we finish the 50,000 words.
thanks for your input

I know there was one just outside of that area. It's burned down last decade, and I'm not sure how much information there is on it. It's called Hopewell Sanitorium. I haven't done any research on it, but I think most of what you'll find about it are ghost stories. Good luck!

Kalla

Not everyone exposed to TB gets the disease - sometimes the immune system completely gets rid of it and no one really knows why, although having a healthy diet must help. But what makes it really cool as diseases go is that you can be latently infected all your life and never have any actual symptoms. It is thought that, today, around 1/3 of the world is infected with TB and only 10% of these will get the coughing, wasting away and night-sweating disease. This is why lots of people exposed to a TB patient test positive and it is possible that they will develop proper TB late in life when their immune system gets weak.

thanks kalla,

i'll check it out, looks like she's going to have to go to a sanitorium for at least a month. would be nice if closer to home.

thanks,

your information has been very helpful, just one last question, i know you are busy on your own novel, medical i bet !

i want to sanitize the tb dishes, with bleach, i heard 10% solution ?? is that too much, what ratio ??

then let air dry.

appreciate all the help from everybody