# List off your favorite old-timey disease names! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 9, 2003, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010 "2003-12-09T20:57:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![scout1222](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/34f0e0/32.png) [@scout1222](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scout1222)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2003, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/21 "2003-12-09T23:16:29Z")
I’m keen on consumption, which was what I came in here to post. But now that I’ve heard some of yours, I think I’ll add dropsy to the list. It sounds like a problem involving the hand - you can’t hold on to anything! ---
**Author:** ![cadolphin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c37758/32.png) [@cadolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cadolphin)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2003, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/22 "2003-12-09T23:17:11Z")
“The vapors” - I have that. It’s called Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) now. ---
**Author:** ![Rodd\_Hill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3ab097/32.png) [@Rodd\_Hill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodd_Hill)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/23 "2003-12-10T00:25:44Z")
Methinks thou has the Blue Devils. ---
**Author:** ![hebesphenomegacorona](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b9e5f3/32.png) [@hebesphenomegacorona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hebesphenomegacorona)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/24 "2003-12-10T01:29:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Murcielago \* > \*\*Hyperthyroidism was once called “Cretinism.” \*\* I thought that that was hypothyroidism. Isn’t hyperthyroidism called something along the lines of Gray’s disease? ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/25 "2003-12-10T01:34:49Z")
Fistulous withers. ---
**Author:** ![NurseCarmen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5daacb/32.png) [@NurseCarmen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NurseCarmen)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/26 "2003-12-10T01:53:04Z")
Hey! I always thought the vapors was the farts. Learn something new every day. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/27 "2003-12-10T02:02:42Z")
water brash, puerile respirations, scorbutus, crowing disease, running at the loins, rupia, sudamina, whites, running at the reins… They go on and on. They’re all lifted from the “Medical Adviser” by R. Thompson, circa 1860. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/28 "2003-12-10T02:23:11Z")
I thought lumbago was the “forbidden dance”… ---
**Author:** ![Murcielago](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/da6949/32.png) [@Murcielago](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Murcielago)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/29 "2003-12-10T02:27:09Z")
You are correct, **hebesphenomegacorona** , hyp **o** thyroidism is cretinism. Dammit, that’ll teach me to use Google before trusting my memory. ---
**Author:** ![eman77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f04885/32.png) [@eman77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eman77)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/30 "2003-12-10T02:49:09Z")
I always thought syphilis (spelling)? sounded pretty nasty. I don’t have it by the way. ---
**Author:** ![Macrophage](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/87869e/32.png) [@Macrophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Macrophage)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/31 "2003-12-10T02:54:09Z")
Grave’s disease is a form of hyperthyroidism. Cretinism is still used methinks and refers to hypothyroidism. My all time favorite: pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/32 "2003-12-10T02:54:21Z")
Cholera, typhoid, typhus, scarlet fever, consumption. And even though it’s not really old anymore, I like talking about influenza, rather than the flu. Women also had hysteria, and “nervous conditions”. ---
**Author:** ![quiltguy154](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/ad7895/32.png) [@quiltguy154](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/quiltguy154)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/33 "2003-12-10T03:13:20Z")
Don’t forget _quinsy_ and it’s-gotta’- be-bad-cause-it-sounds-bad _scrofula_. ---
**Author:** ![Sternvogel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Sternvogel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sternvogel)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/34 "2003-12-10T03:30:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Macrophage \* > **Grave’s disease is a form of hyperthyroidism.** [nitpick] Graves’ disease, named after Irish physician R. J. Graves. I remember hearing a recording of [this song](http://www.acronet.net/~robokopp/usa/invalid.htm) as part of a high-school history class on the American Civil War. Ticerdolerreou is actually _tic douloureux_, a severe stabbing pain afflicting one side of the face. Yaws is a funny-sounding name for a rather serious tropical disease sometimes characterized by destructive lesions of the skin and bones. The attendant raspberrylike skin eruptions are responsible for the illness’s alternate name, frambesia (from French _framboise_, raspberry). ---
**Author:** ![jsleek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8dc957/32.png) [@jsleek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsleek)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/35 "2003-12-10T03:39:05Z")
I read in Asimov that the Greeks called cancer the stinking death. ---
**Author:** ![schplebordnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/91b2a8/32.png) [@schplebordnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/schplebordnik)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/36 "2003-12-10T03:45:57Z")
How about old school Hysteria? And to think, you had to go to a doctor to get “the treatment”; now, it is easily acquired OTC. [http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0801859417/inktomi-bkasin-20/ref%3Dnosim/002-8879366-1024029](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0801859417/inktomi-bkasin-20/ref%3Dnosim/002-8879366-1024029) ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Babbington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Mr.Babbington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Babbington)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/37 "2003-12-10T04:43:29Z")
Im a fan of scurvy. I have a friend who went down to Florida for school. He needed something to do, so he figured his choices were to give himself scurvy, or go vegetarian. He decided to go vegetarian, the wuss. Also, pellagra is a good one. Then there’s the good old Black Death, rickets, hysteria, leprosy, the “Great Pox,” syphillis, and malaria. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Babbington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Mr.Babbington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Babbington)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/38 "2003-12-10T04:45:53Z")
Malaria, which they used to call “Roman Fever.” ---
**Author:** ![GaterMouth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f1d935/32.png) [@GaterMouth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GaterMouth)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/39 "2003-12-10T05:00:25Z")
EBOLA (HAEMORRHAGIC FEVER) one of the most virulent viral diseases known to humankind, causing death in 50-90% of all clinically ill cases. Symptoms: Ebola is often characterized by the sudden onset of fever, weakness, muscle pain, headache and sore throat. This is followed by vomiting, diarrhoea, rash, limited kidney and liver functions, and both internal and external bleeding. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2003, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010/40 "2003-12-10T05:40:47Z")
I actually have dropsy. Also Pickwickian syndrome. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/list-off-your-favorite-old-timey-disease-names/218010.md?page=3)