Researches into the action of mercury, podophylline, and taraxacum on the biliary secretion : being the report of the Edinburgh Committee of the British Medical Association / by John Hughes Bennett.

  • Bennett, John Hughes, 1812-1875.
Date:
1869
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Credit: Researches into the action of mercury, podophylline, and taraxacum on the biliary secretion : being the report of the Edinburgh Committee of the British Medical Association / by John Hughes Bennett. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    inasmuch as in our experiments the common bile-duct had been divided, the nerves alkided to might have been so injured that stimulation of the orifice of the common bile-duct could no longer excite the secretion. It remains to be shown, however, that mercurials do specially excite the orifice of the bile-duct. It is not probable, at any rate, that their influence on the biliary secretion was, in the cases of dogs 6, 7, and 8, prevented by division of hepatic nerves. In these experiments the common bile-duct was simply divided with as little injury to neighbouring parts as possible (in previous experiments a portion of the bile-duct was removed), and these animals did not suffer in the least from the shock after the operation; so that nervous injury could not have been extensive. Moreover, in the case of dog 7, the parts around the com- mon bile-duct were dissected after death, and the nerves proceeding from the solar plexus to the liver were found at some distance from the duct, and had apparently suffered no injury at the place where it had been divided. The Committee, therefore, do not attach any value to this objection. Eut some may say that although we have proved that mercury diminishes the biliary secretion in dogs and that in man its action will in all probability be the same, yet our experiments have been performed on animals in a state of health, and that had they been made on dogs with diseases such as those in which mercury has been supposed to increase the hepatic secretion, it would possibly, in the case of such dogs, have been increased. \Yith such an hypo- thesis w^e need not seriously occupy ourselves until the objectors prove that, in any case whatever, mercury can increase the biliary secretion in man. We have been unable to discover any facts brought to light in this or any other age which prove that mercury stimulates the biliary secretion. So far as we can make out, the notion that it does so originates in some vague statement made by Paracelsus*, or the authors of his time, as to the good effects of mercury in what he has called icteritia. But, we repeat, not only do we not know how such a notion has arisen, but we are ignorant how to make direct observations on the subject in man. AYe have already stated that such observations are, in the present state of physiological che- mistry, impossible (see p. 187). We do not deny the possibility of mercury being useful in some diseases of the liver; we simply say that the notion of its doing good by increasing the biliary secretion is untenable. Observations on Podophtlline and Taeasacum as Cholagogues. Before concluding our observations on dogs with biliary fistulse, the Com- mittee thought it would be important to try the effect of two other drugs which have been supposed to exercise a cholagogue influence on the liver, viz. podophylline and taraxacum. Observations ivith PodophyUlne. Dog 9 was a retriever, about three years old, weighing 26-6 kilogrammes, and the operation for biliary fistulas was performed upon July 24, 1868. The recovery was rapid. Shortly after the operation the faeces were clay- coloured. TableXYII.,p. 225, shows the results of the bile collections pre- vious to, during, and after the administration of podophylline. ^ Paracelsus (Aur. Phil. Theoph.), Opera Medico-Chemica, 3 torn. 4to, Francof. 1603- 1605. De Icteritiis, vol. i. p. 329.