On the use of bromide of potassium and salicylate of sodium in headache / by T. Lauder Brunton.

  • Brunton, Thomas Lauder, Sir, 1844-1916.
Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the use of bromide of potassium and salicylate of sodium in headache / by T. Lauder Brunton. 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.

    3/11
    ON THE USE OE BROMIDE OF POTASSIUM AND SATJCYLATE OF SODIUM IN HEAD- ACHE. By T. Laudei; Buunton, M.])., D.Sc. Ediii., Lfi.I). Hon. Aber, F.R.C.r., F.R.S. (Re|)iinted from the Practitioner^ February, 1894.) In' a paper publislied in tlie Si. Bartholomew’s Hospital Reports, ill 1883, I mentioned tlie use of salicylate of sodium in relieving headache.^' The formula that I then recommended was two and a half grains of tlie salicylate of sodium, given either alone or with some aromatic s]uiits of ammonia, every lialf-hour while the headache lasts. In some cases this form of administration is no doubt useful, but since the paper in which I recommended it appeared, antipyrin has nearly displaced the salicylate as a means of cutting short a headache which has already begun. One great difficulty which is to be met with in treating nervous headaches, or .so-called bilious headaches, is that once the headache has become severe, both secretion and absorption from the stomach are generally arrested, and that any medicine which is taken by the mouth when the headache is fairly begun lies in the stomach unabsorbed and useless. Consequently it is sometimes almost imperative to treat such cases, when the headache is intense, by the subcutaneous injec- tion of morphine. It may not unfrequently be noticed that if the headache comes on shortly after food has been taken, for example, an hour or half an hour after breakfast, the secretion will have occurred before the pain has commenced, and the gastric juices will dissolve the food. But the food will not be absorbed and will be brought up in full quantity, but well digested, many houm afteiwai’ds, say in the evening. Should the headache, however, have become well established before h ‘ Disorders of Digestion,’ p. 98.