The Medical History and the Death Cause of Young-Jo Based on the Seungjeongwon Ilgi (Royal Secretariat Logs) / 의사학

Young-Jo, 83 years old, was the longest lived king of the Chosun Dynasty. Seungjeongwon Ilgi gives more detail about the diseases and prescriptions of Young-Jo. We could close look at what the Annals of the Chosun Dynasty just described that king received medical attention. In inspecting Jung-Jo's constitution, to examine his medical history is very important. Yong-jo had a weak constitution, but he was always concerned about health care. Youn-jo complained of colic syndrom and heart fire when young; ascris and shoulder pain since middle age; severe fatigue and gait disturbance caused by edema in his latter years. During his last 20 years, he had taken and resorted to Ken-GongTang, the reason was not psychological disposion, but physical disease. Also, Yong-Jo's condition just before death could be assumed in Seungjeongwon Ilgi and Jonhyeongak Ilgi. According to continuous complaints such as edema of the lower limbs, faint(lethargy) and eating disorder caused by abnormal rising of GI (anorexia), we could presume that the cause of death was uremia. In addition, it has significance to correct feasible misconceaption about the cause of death grounded on The Annals of the Chosun Dynasty.

A fadiga e seus transtornos: condições de possibilidade, ascensão e queda da neurastenia novecentista / Fatigue and its disturbances: conditions of possibility and the rise and fall of twentieth-century neurasthenia

Analisa alguns dos elementos sociohistóricos que configuraram condições de possibilidade para a emergência da neurastenia como categoria nosológica, na segunda metade do século XIX, bem como os aspectos que influenciaram seu declínio em meios médicos e leigos. Propõe breve apresentação dessa categoria médica e discussão mais detalhada sobre alguns debates em que ela encontra sustentação, tais como a ideia do desgaste do suprimento nervoso, os estudos e as preocupações novecentistas sobre a fadiga e a pressuposição da somatogênese da doença. Analisa, por fim, o processo de declínio da categoria ressaltando alguns elementos que alteraram seu estatuto e sua utilidade como diagnóstico.

The article first analyzes some of the social and historical components underlying the conditions of possibility that allowed neurasthenia to emerge as a nosological category in the latter half of the nineteenth century and then explores the elements that influenced its demise in medical and lay circles. It offers a brief introduction to this medical category and a more detailed discussion of some supporting debates, including the idea of nervous exhaustion, twentieth-century studies and concerns on fatigue, and the malady's presumed somatogenesis. The concluding analysis of how the category met its demise highlights elements that altered its status and its diagnostic usefulness.