The action of remedies and the experimental method / by Thomas R. Fraser.

  • Fraser, Sir Thomas Richard, 1841-1920.
Date:
1882
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The action of remedies and the experimental method / by Thomas R. Fraser. 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.

    10/14 (page 10)
    JO Iheir only effect. They produced insensibility, but they also produced other actions, which assumed a grave importance, as they were occasionally sufficient to destroy life. The nature of these addititional actions became, therefore, a matter of interest, for upon them apparently depended many questions governing the indications for the use of anaesthetics and the treatment which should be adopted in order to avert or counteract their dan- gerous effects. No sufficient light, however, could be thrown upon them by the simple experiments which were sufficient to prove that these substances produce insensibility. By observing the phenomena presented by a patient in the anaesthetic condition, the mechanism by which the dangerous effects were caused could not be revealed. It could not even be determined whether death were produced by an action upon the brain, or upon the heart, or upon the respiration. The necessity for extending the investi- _gation of their action to lower animals, in whom the experimental •conditions could be controlled and varied, became obvious; and the researches which have already been undertaken by Hermann, Paul Bert, Ferguson, Coates, and McKendrick, have furnished much information widi regard to those difficulties that could not be .solved by mere observations of effects in human beings. They have provided indications for forming an opinion of the relative dangerousness of many antesthetics, of the class of cases in which each should be specially avoided, and of the means by which their dangerous actions may be best counteracted; and it is needless to remark that, if results of such importance can be obtained by no other means than by experiments upon the lower animals, the performance of such experiments is an imperative •duty. I have already defined pharmacology as the science of the action ■of remedies, and pointed out that, like every other science, it must be founded upon experiment; while, from the nature of its problems, the experiments must be performed upon living beings. These propositions are generally recognized by those who are en- gaged in the study of the means of treating disease; and upon their application the ]Dresent condition of medical art and science is dependent. Embarrassment and difficulties have, however, been encountered in the application of the last proposition, which, for-