A study of doses / by William Sharp.

  • William Sharp
Date:
1890
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A study of doses / by William Sharp. 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.

    14/48 (page 14)
    one minute he suddenly threw up a large quantity of brownish liquid, having a strong smell of laudanum, followed by more, amounting to between one and two pints. He was then made to swallow warm water; was dragged from one room to another, and kept incessantly on his legs; on Nov, 8 he was able to walk out of doors; his appetite was not yet returned; his bowels had not been moved; in a few days he was perfectly recovered. Here we have again one action of depression. It may be inferred that between the dose of one ounce causing great excitement, and the dose of six ounces causing apoplexy, there are again intermediate doses having the two contrary actions in succession. It appears, therefore, that it is necessary to divide the doses of Opium into at least seven groups ; two groups are exciting or stimulating, two are depressing or paralysing, with intermediate doses having one action succeeded by the other. Therapeutic uses. By practitioners of the old school, Dr. Lauder Brunton tells us, the general uses of Opium in disease are (1) to lessen pain ; (2) to produce sleep ; (3) to lessen irritation in various organs.''^ For none of these purposes has it been used by me for forty years. By them it is daily prescribed for diai-rhoea; it is one of my best remedies for constipation. By them it is forbidden to be used for congestion of the braint; for this formidable disease it is the best remedy I know. The above experiments also suggest it as a stomachic and tonic, and I have used it as such with success for loss of appetite from mental exhaustion. In all these cases the doses have been fractions of a drop of the Tincture. Dr. Applebe.— Sep. 17, 1889. I have been vastly pleased with the purgative effects of Opium in the small doses. Oct. 27. Since my first experiment with Opium, [_i^th of a minim, given to the young milliner. Essay LVI], I have verified it again and again. I feel that I have a powerful weapon in my hand in this drug, which I knew before only as a narcotic and sedative. In reply to my enquiries after his first case. Dr. Applebe * PAamacoZo^y, 3rd ed., p. 859. t Qp. ci^., p. 862.