An experimental inquiry into the effect upon the mother of poisoning the foetus / by W.S. Savory.

  • Savory, William Scovell, 1826-1895.
Date:
[1858]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An experimental inquiry into the effect upon the mother of poisoning the foetus / by W.S. Savory. 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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    fojtusesj were completely set at rest. The parts were found in the abdomen as they had been replaced, and the foetus, which was operated on in the uterus, still remained there. Now I am satisfied that in these experiments none of the solution escaped from the foetus through the puncture, because I ascertained that if proper precaution had been adopted in the injection, none escaped upon pressure. Mox'eover I had learned from another set of experiments, that when the solution is allowed to come into direct contact with the maternal tissues, as when injected into the uterine or peritoneal cavity, or when allowed to escape from the foetus, its symptoms are never delayed for a period at all ajiproaching the length of time which elapsed between the closure of the abdomen and their manifestation in these experiments. The usual period is two minutes, and this is rarely extended to five. The animal is in most instances dead before that period. But that this source of fallacy did not arise, I have moi*e than once unintentionally obtained still better evidence in another way. Some of my experiments, the earlier ones more especially, were attended with a negative result. Foetuses were injected and returned into the mother, but no visible effects on her of the poison followed. Prolonged exposure and rough manipulation when the foetuses were small and feeble, had been fatal to their circulation. But I now see the importance of the negative results which these experiments yielded. The solution could not have escaped from them, or in any way have come into contact with the maternal tissues. More recently I have performed the following experiment. Experiment II.—I removed two foetuses within a day or two of their full term from the uterus of a cat immediately after its death from chloroform, having previously placed ligatures on the foetal portion of the cords. They both were lively. I injected ten minims of the solution into the abdominal cavity of each by perforating the walls with the point of the syringe
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