A treatise on the structure, economy, and diseases of the liver; with an inquiry into the properties and component parts of bile and biliary calculi. To which is now added a more particular account of the hepatitis of India, with observations on the prevalent use of mercury in the diseases of this country / [William Saunders].
- William Saunders
- Date:
- 1809
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A treatise on the structure, economy, and diseases of the liver; with an inquiry into the properties and component parts of bile and biliary calculi. To which is now added a more particular account of the hepatitis of India, with observations on the prevalent use of mercury in the diseases of this country / [William Saunders]. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![operation. But its having this effect in acute hepatitis, can only depend on its lessening or remov- ing in the first instance, that inflammatory con- striction of the ducts which occasions the bile to be retained in the liver; for(as I have already observed) other medicines, the general cathartic effect of which is much greater than calomel, are by no means of equal service. It amounts, I think, to a proof of this opinion, that even calomel fails if it pass through the bowels quickly; and that I have often been obliged to assist its relaxing power on the biliary ducts, by joining it with opium and antimonial powder, especially the former, which I give to the amount of a grain or more every six hours, or as often as the urgency of the pain renders necessary. Under this management, I have repeatedly found the urgent symptoms abate considerably, many hours before any alyine evacuation took place, and of course before the calomel could be said to act as a cathartic : in some cases too, where no evacuation followed, it became necessary to give cathartic medicines afterwards, in order to secure the relief which the calomel had procured, and to prevent the pain and dyspnea from returning ; which they were - apt to do, if the liver was not emptied while under the relaxing influence of the calomel] and opium. It not unfrequently happens, that the stomach partakes so much of the inflammatory condition of the liver,](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b33089322_0435.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
