Devices and therapies

Dr Carter Moffat’s Ammoniaphone

Source: The Graphic, Sat 25 October 1884 The format of this one makes it a bit tricky to type out, but if you click on the advert, you should then be able to zoom in and read it. The Ammoniaphone was an instrument designed to help singers and public speakers improve the quality of their […]

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Nutt's Trusses for Ruptures

STeel Spring or Jointed Trusses for the help and cure of Ruptures for Men, Women and Children in the Navel, Cod or Groin. Belt Trusses, made without Iron or Steel Bow, the Belt or Girdle is with Neats Leather, Silk or Velvet, being very easy, with a Spring good for all tender Bodies, especially for […]

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Dr Young’s Rectal Dilators

Source: Detroit Medical Journal August 1905 As you can see, this ad is aimed at the medical profession, and the product was (and still is) accepted by orthodox practitioners as helpful for certain conditions – it was not so much the dilators themselves but the claims made about their efficacy that at one point pushed […]

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Magic Foot Drafts

RHEUMATISM Cured Through the Feet Without Medicine An external cure so sure that the makers send it FREE ON APPROVAL. Try it. Send your name and address to the makers of Magic Foot Drafts, the great cure for every kind of rheumatism; Chronic or Acute, Muscular, Sciatic, Lumbago, Gout, etc., no matter where located or […]

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Dr Junod's Exhausting Apparatus

Important Notice to the Afflicted ALL Persons suffering from PARALYSIS, SPINAL AFFECTIONS, RHEUMATISM, NEURAL- GIA, ASTHMA, Pain in the Head, or all cases of INFLAM- MATION or CONGESTION, should at once try Mr G. W. Gedney’s VACUUM APPARATUS, by Dr. Junod, which has been practised with great success for upwards of 40 years. Testimonials of […]

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La Vida Vibrator

Source: The Syracuse Herald (NY) 7 Sept 1919 . Every Woman needs a Vibrator La Vida $7.50 The Vibrator EVERY Woman Needs There comes a new world, a generous world of abundant health, of comfort, of beauty measured by long years—when La Vida enters in. To own La Vida is every woman’s right—it costs so […]

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Allcock's Porous Plasters

Source: The Penny Illustrated Paper and Illustrated Times, Sat 26 January 1895. To view this rather fine-looking gentleman in full technicolour glory, click this ad from the National Archives. Allcock’s Plasters had their origins in an invention patented in the US in 1845 by Horace Day and William Shecut. (Day was a wealthy manufacturer of rubber […]

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Sparks and Son India-Rubber Urinals

Far from being a quack remedy, this device must have been a boon to desperate travellers everywhere. Surgical instrument maker William Huntly Bailey, whom we have met before, described the problem:  If there is any inconvenience in travelling on the railway, it is on account of the few stoppages, and no doubt many persons have […]

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Ludlam's Electric Rubber

Source: The Medical Directory for Scotland, 1853 (click to enlarge ad or see transcript below.) This product was reviewed by The London Lancet, (vol.1 1851) which heartily endorsed it as a way of creating rapid and healthy circulation of the blood on the surface after bathing. “Rubber” here means something to be used for rubbing, […]

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Pure and Healthy Leeches

Pure   and   Healthy   Leeches.—Potter and HAILEY beg to assure the Profession, Druggists, &c., that the Leeches they offer are such as can be recommended for Purity, Health, and Readiness of Biting. POTTER AND HAILEY, Importers of Leeches and Turkey Sponge, Herbalists, &c., 66, Farringdon-market, London. Source: The Medical Times and Gazette, 3 […]

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