Observations on the functional disorders of the kidneys, which give rise to the formation of urinary calculi : with remarks on their frequency in the county of Norfolk / by William England.

Date:
[1830]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the functional disorders of the kidneys, which give rise to the formation of urinary calculi : with remarks on their frequency in the county of Norfolk / by William England. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    few drops of liquor potassae, taken into the stomach in gonorrhoea, may be explained by the existence of a somewhat analogous sympathy between the gastric and the extreme portion of the genito-urinary mucous membranes. The powdered leaves, and also the infusion of the arbutus uvae ursi, have been long considered a most powerful remedy in calculous disorders. I have certainly seen much benefit derived from its use in allaying irritation of the urinary system, and it is probable that its employment at a very early period, w hen the first changes in the urine indicate the commencement of the lithic diathesis, might be found highly beneficial. De Haen first drew the attention of practitioners to its use in disorders of the urinary passages : Dr. Cullen believed that the action of the remedy depended upon its astringent property. If this really is its mode of action, I should expect that this astringent power is conveyed by nervous sympathy to the renal vessels, in which it dimi- nishes the tendency to take on an unnatural power of secretion. But with respect to the action of uva ursi, though it may not be irra- tional to attribute to it a specific quality, it is always found that the sym])toms for which it is employed are sooner removed by its being com- bined with opium, hyoscyamus,or muriatic acid ; and an individual action is therefore often attri- F 2
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