On the pathology of night-sweating in phthisis : and the mode of action of strychnia and other remedies in it / by T. Lauder Brunton.
- Brunton, Thomas Lauder, Sir, 1844-1916.
- Date:
- [1879]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: On the pathology of night-sweating in phthisis : and the mode of action of strychnia and other remedies in it / by T. Lauder Brunton. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![These vaso-raotor nerves, being stimulated by the drug, cause the vessels to contract to such an extent as to cut off the su[)ply of blood from the glands almost entirely. The secreting cells are thus deprived of the material from which the saliva ought to be formed, and thus, notwithstanding the functional activity which they are exerting under the stimulus of the secreting nerves, the formation of saliva very shortly comes to an end. In persons who are poisoned with belladonna it has been observed that the vessels of the sldn were much dilated, so that the skin itself was covered with a scarlet flush, notwithstanding which the surface was dry. This dryness was not confined to the skin, but extended to the mouth, and it was caused both in the mouth and on the skin by the paralysis of the secreting nerves of the salivaiy and sweat glands produced by the drug. Calabar bean, on the contrary, causes a certain amount of sali- vation and cold sweats; and other drugs, such as pilocarpine, which does not, like calabar bean, limit its own action upon the secreting cells of the salivary glands by lessening their blood supply, causes very profuse salivation as well as profuse sweat- ing. Now the action of pilocarpine is exerted upon the termina- tions of the secreting nerves in the salivary and sweat glands, and does not seem to be dependent upon any action on the nerve centres. But although pilocarpine may stimulate the sweat glands by acting upon the ends of the secreting nerves within them, it is j)robable that, in ordinary circumstances, the secretion is regu- lated,not by the condition of the terminal filaments of the secretory nerves, but by the nerve centres acting on the glands through those nerves. The nerve centres for the secretion of sweat lie ])artly in the spinal cord and partly in the medulla oblongata. In this respect they resemble two other important nerve centres, viz., the centre for respiration, or respiratory centre, and the vaso-motor centre—the respiratoiy centre, by which the respira- tory muscles ai’e innervated and the respiratory movements kept up, and the vaso-motor centre, from which stimuli constantly j)roceeding to the vessels keep them in a state of chronic con- traction. Both these centres were formerly supposed to be situated in the medulla oblongata alone, because when the medulla was separated from the cord by a tiansverse cut at tlie level of the occiput, respiration ceased, and the tonic contraction of the vessels in the body at once ceased, and they became dilated. It was first shown by Schiff, however, that if part of the medulla were destroyed, so as to cause the respiratory move- ments completely to cease, the death of the animal, which would usually occur under such conditions, might be prevented by the](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2242944x_0005.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
