[Sidenote: People overhead.]
One thing more:--From the flimsy manner in which most modern houses are
built, where every step on the stairs, and along the floors, is felt all
over the house; the higher the story, the greater the vibration. It is
inconceivable how much the sick suffer by having anybody overhead. In
the solidly built old houses, which, fortunately, most hospitals are,
the noise and shaking is comparatively trifling. But it is a serious
cause of suffering, in lightly built houses, and with the irritability
peculiar to some diseases. Better far put such patients at the top of
the house, even with the additional fatigue of stairs, if you cannot
secure the room above them being untenanted; you may otherwise bring on
a state of restlessness which no opium will subdue. Do not neglect the
warning, when a patient tells you that he "Feels every step above him to
cross his heart." Remember that every noise a patient cannot _see_
partakes of the character of suddenness to him; and I am persuaded that
patients with these peculiarly irritable nerves, are positively less
injured by having persons in the same room with them than overhead, or
separated by only a thin compartment.
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