Solomon favoured genre scenes and works on literary themes. Painted in 1861, his penultimate year, this painting is one of his last works and also his most witty. It takes as its subject the French seventeenth-century playwright Molière’s popular play, 'Le Malade Imaginaire' (or 'The Hypochrondriac'). In a scene from Act II, Argan, the eponymous hypochondriac, propped up against a pillow on his chair, looks on in alarm as his pulse is taken on one side by Diafoirus, a pompous and supposedly respectable, but in reality, ignorant Paris doctor, and on the other by Diaforius’ son, Thomas, who is trying to ingratiate himself with Argan. Toinette, the no-nonsense maid, prepares him a compound and looks on with detached amusement (it is her wit and resourcefulness which will triumph at the end of the play). Solomon delighted in bringing out the individual personality of each of the play's characters, particularly in their telling attitudes and facial expressions, as well as their gorgeous costumes and details of the interior, that bring the story to life. The critic James Dafforne in The Art Journal (1 March 1862, pp. 73-75) commented that this work 'well sustained the artist's reputation'.

This version of the painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy on 6 May 1861 as (no. 464) 'La Malade Imaginaire'. Another version is held by the Wellcome Collection in London, along with an engraving of this version by H. Bourne (after Abraham Solomon). The British Museum holds a copy of the same engraving, from the Collection of R.P. Harding, Esq. Wood Hall, East Dulwich, who originally owned this painting. (The Wellcome also has another Solomon painting on the same subject but a different less finished composition.)