The development of inhalation anaesthesia : with special reference to the years 1846-1900... / [Barbara M. Duncum].
- Duncum, Barbara M.
- Date:
- 1947
Licence: In copyright
Credit: The development of inhalation anaesthesia : with special reference to the years 1846-1900... / [Barbara M. Duncum]. Source: Wellcome Collection.
482/664 page 462
![' The details of every case, both in the complicated and uncomplicated divisions, were submitted to elaborate tabulation. ' Records of the administration of 43 distinct anaesthetics, mixtures, or successions of anaesthetics administered in different ways were contained in the books. But, although the number was thus large, the administrations in over 21,000 cases were confined to chloroform, ether, gas and ether, A.G.E. mixture, and mixtures of chloroform and ether in various proportions ; whilst nitrous oxide and the same gas with oxygen accounted for over 3500 cases, leaving only about 1200 cases f1] to be distributed amongst the remaining 38 anaesthetics. ' It was only when the departure from the normal in any case was held to be due partly or entirely to the anaesthetic, that the case was placed in the complicated division. . . . ' In the next table are found the cases of danger {including deaths) considered to be due entirely to the anaesthetic. . . . No. of Anaesthetic [2] Total Cases A and B together Cases of D Recovered anger Died Total Cases of Danger Ratio of Danger to Total Administrations 1 13,393 75 3 78 0-582 2 4,595 3 0 3 0-065 3 2,071 2 0 2 0-096 4 678 1 0 1 0-147 5 418 2 0 2 0-478 7 208 1 0 1 0-480 8 225 4 1 5 22 9 155 0 0 0 o-ooo 14 275 1 0 1 O36 generally recognized. It seemed to me, therefore, that the time had arrived when an attempt should be made to form a special Society of Anaesthetists ; I accordingly placed myself in communication with the leaders of the profession in this branch, by whom the suggestion was received with much favour, both in London and the Provinces. . . . The Society started with a membership roll of forty, and the first list of Officers was as follows : President, F. Woodhouse Braine ; Treasurer, Dr. Dudley W. Buxton ; Secretary, Dr. Silk ; Council, Dr. Stallard and Mr. G. E. Norton. . . . The first [annual volume of Transactions] . . . was published in 1898. . . .' In June 1908 the Society amalgamated with the new Royal Society of Medicine as the Section of Anaesthetics. (Trans. Soc. Anaesth., 1908, 9, 1-5.) 1 Many of these cases were accounted for (by twos and threes) by the use of various ingeniously complex, but sometimes pointless and often dangerous sequences of the anaesthetics and anaesthetic mixtures listed from 1 to 14 in the table on p. 461. A few cases Were accounted for by similar sequences supplemented by subcutaneous injections of morphine or atropine and morphine. 2 These numbers correspond to the anaesthetics similarly numbered in the table on p. 461.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b20457200_0486.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
