The management and diseases of the dog / by John Woodroffe Hill.

Date:
1878
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The management and diseases of the dog / by John Woodroffe Hill. 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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    of whicli in the vocabulary of the quack are mange. While for alterative, aperient, or emetic purposes, calomel is used most indiscreetly. Symptoms.—In mercurialism, the salivary secretion is un- usually abundant, the teeth are loose and discoloured, the ' gums spongy, swollen, and tender, and of a deep red, often approaching a purple hue. The breath is singularly foetid; the tongue loaded with brown fur, and red down the sides. There is little appetite, but excessive thirst. Sloughing and ulceration of the mucous membrane of the mouth frequently follow, and if the mercurial doses have been excessive the stomach and intestines are in a like manner affected, resulting in blood-stained vomits and san- guinary purging. If suitable measures are not taken to check these effects, considerable irritative fever is established. Extreme debility follows, the hair falls off, the animal becomes rapidly emaciated, tremulous, and paralytic, and dies in convulsions or delirium. ]X^ot unfrequently the face is considerably swollen, and the joints are hot and tender. Mercurialism also gives rise to a species of eczema (eczema mercuriale). See Skin Diseases. Treatment.—The most effectual antidotes for poisoning by mercury are albuminous compounds, the white of eggs being perhaps the best, especially in the case of corrosive sublimate. Christison, writing on the subject, observes : It has already been hinted that albumen, in the form of white of eggs beat up with water, impairs or destroys the corrosive properties of bichloride of mercury, by decomposing it, and producing an insoluble mercurial compound. Tor tliis discovery, and the establishment of albumen as an antidote, medicine is indebted to Professor Orfila. He has related many satisfactory ex- periments in proof of its virtues. The following will serve as an example of the whole. Twelve grains of corrosive sublimate were given to a little dog, and allowed to act for eight minutes, so that its usual effects might fairly begin