On functional derangements of the liver : being the Croonian lectures delivered at the Royal College of Physicians in March 1874 / by Charles Murchison.

  • Murchison, Charles, 1830-1879.
Date:
1874
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On functional derangements of the liver : being the Croonian lectures delivered at the Royal College of Physicians in March 1874 / by Charles Murchison. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    the preparations of mercury,’1 which, I may add, are often contraindicated in chronic gout with renal disease. With these remedies we may include Taraxacum, which has long been thought to exercise a specific action upon the liver, but which probably acts mainly as a mild aperient. When there is a tendency to constipation, it may be advantageously combined with either alkalies or mineral acids. 4. Alkalies.—Next to aperients, alkalies are the most useful drugs in the treatment of functional derangements of the liver. In lithsemia and in many of the symptoms which spring from this morbid state, the greatest benefit is often derived from a course of alkalies—such as the alkaline salts of potash, soda, or lithia, or some of the alkaline mineral waters, such as those of Vais, Vichy, or Ems. The comparative worth of the different alkalies for neutralising acids varies considerably. One grain of carbonate of lithia or of carbonate of ammonia is nearly equal to a grain and a half of carbonate of soda or two grains of carbonate of potash. The beneficial effects of alkalies in derangements of the liver are not due to their neutralising acidity, or to any direct action upon lithic acid. It is, in fact, in the form of lithate of soda that 1 Op. cit., p. 410.