Copy 1, Volume 1

The study of medicine. Improved from the author's manuscripts, and by reference to the latest advances in physiology, pathology, and practice / [John Mason Good].

  • John Mason Good
Date:
1834
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The study of medicine. Improved from the author's manuscripts, and by reference to the latest advances in physiology, pathology, and practice / [John Mason Good]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    127/784 page 73
    , | When mercurial salivation is produced, it is accompanied with a high degree of irritation, not only of the mouth and fauces, but of the system generally. The common course of symptoms is as follows : the mouth feels unusually hot, and is sensible of a coppery or metallic taste; the lingual and sublingual glands swell; aphthous vesicles appear, and terminate in minute and offensive exulcerations ; the tongue tumefies ; the throat becomes sore; pyrexy and sleep- lessness supervene, and are, indeed, often present from an early period of the disease; while in idiosyncrasies, or habits of great irritability, we frequently find the surface of the body wholly, or in particular parts, reddened with a peculiar erythematic inflammation, continuous or itt patches, to which the name of hydrargyria has been given by some writers, and that of erythema mercuriale by others. [Gangrene and necrosis may be the consequences of immoderate mercurial salivation. Large sloughs of the parts in the mouth are very common. Cullerier has seen a partial necrosis of the lower jaw produced in this manner, and, in one young woman, a complete necrosis of the upper and lower alveolary arches.* The editor of this work has witnessed several melancholy examples of the same kind.] It is difficult to determine by what means mercury produces its effect on the salivary glands. Dr. Cullen attempted one explanation of the subject ; namely, that “mercury. has a particular disposition to unite with ammoniacal salts, and that such salts are disposed to pass off by the salivary glands more copiously, than by any other excretion.’ But, as Dr. Murray has remarked, mercury has not any peculiar tendency of this kind. Indeed, if it had, no ammoni- acal salts are mentioned, either by Berzelius, or by Tiedemann and Gmelin, as entering into the composition of the saliva. Dr. Cullen regards mercury as nothing more than a general irritant, operating equally upon all the sensible and moving fibres of the body, and hence powerfully operating upon all the excretories of the system, without having a special affinity to one set more than to another. Gen. IT. Spec. I. a P. hy- drargyra- tus. Local symptoms of saliv- ation. Hydrargy- ria. Difficulty of account- ing for it. Cullen’s explan- ation. of its reaching and acting upon the organs of perspiration.”+ An- other hypothesis is that of Sir Gilbert Blane{, who considers the salivary glands as one of the outlets for the ramenta of the bones, because lime is detected in the saliva, and even concretes on the teeth. Now, as mercury is known to produce an active absorp- * Dict. des Sciences Méd. tom. xlix. p. 455. Tt Mat. Med. vol. ii. p. 443. Professor A. T. Thomson entertains a similar view : — ** Mercury,” says he, “ in whatever form it is administered, and in what- ever manner it is introduced into the living body, acts asan excitant; a febrile state of the body is induced, evidenced both by the condition of the pulse, and that of the nervous system; and also by an augmented secretion and excretion of the saliva. It is this febrile excitement, overcoming, or destroying the morbid action begun and maintained in the frame by the introduction of the syphilitic or venereal poison into it, which cures syphilis. The action on the salivary glands is only asymptom of this general excitement, induced by mercurials, and not in itself essential to their curative power: it may not be produced by the administration of mercurials, and yet syphilis may be cured by them. In this case the mercurials are nevertheless taken into the circulation, for they communicate a blue appearance to silver articles in the patients’ pockets.” Elem. of Materia Med. vol. i. p. 371.
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3