A synopsis of the various kinds of difficult parturition, with practical remarks on the management of labours / By Samuel Merriman.

  • Samuel Merriman
Date:
1838
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A synopsis of the various kinds of difficult parturition, with practical remarks on the management of labours / By Samuel Merriman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    the os uteri and the externalorgans, But, like other pow- erful remedies, this has sometimes been carried to excess, so as to be injurious to the patient during parturition, and rendering her recovery tedious, if not doubtful. An accoucheur at Paris lately professed to teach a secret, by which all women, even the most deformed, might be easily delivered. His method was to give an emetic to the parturient woman, and he expected that the violent straining to vomit would greatly contribute to force the infant through the pelvis. It was soon found, that this method was altogether inefficacious in cases of distortion; he was therefore compelled to restrict the practice to cases of slow labour, where the pelvis was well formed; but, even in these cases, this plan does not seem to have been productive of much advantage*, and is, I believe, at present, seldom employedt. Upon the principle of producing relaxation, the use of the warm bath has been recommended. This was tried * See Gardien, Traite d’ Accouchemens, tom. ii, p. 273—1807. + Vomiting, though vaunted by the Parisian empiric, as a new remedy in labours, is in fact a very old one. Riverius mentions it upwards of two hundred years ago, and cautions the physi- cian against an injudicious use of it. The late Dr. Lowder, whose practice was very extensive, says, that “‘ he has often known spontaneous vomiting do good; but has seldom found benefit. from the-exhibition of emetics, though he has frequently seen them used,” MS. Lectures. Some writers have recommended remedies of avery nasty cha- racter, to expedite delivery: if such horrible messes ever were serviceable, it was probably. by inducing nausea or. vomiting. Hartman says, ‘ apud pauperes vidi sepe partum difficilem solvi
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