Lectures on diseases of the eye / by Charles Bell Taylor.

  • Bell Taylor
Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Lectures on diseases of the eye / by Charles Bell Taylor. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    20/106 page 16
    10 So that I tliink that tlie advice to persons about to be operated on may be summed up in two lines: Great tomperanco, open air, Easy labour, little care. You cannot train old people; and beyond this it is difficult to go. With regard to anassthetics, when I commenced practice it was the custom to use chloroform in almost every case ; subsequently ether was very generally employed ; but for years past I have operated without any anaesthetic, and but for the splendid discovery of cocaine should have continued to do so. Chloroform I found from time to time gave rise to most distressing symptoms of impending dissolution. Ether caused great excitement. Both were followed by dangerous vomiting, and although the latter is incomparably safer than chloroform, the drunken violence both before and after is more dangerous, and I have known it on three occasions to provoke attacks of bronchitis, one of which proved fatal. Cocaine was employed in the cases we are now discussing, and its effects in numbing sensation, without interfering with the intelligent co-operation of the patient, as usual, left nothing to be desired. As to anti- septics, it was formerly believed that suppuration depended on deficient vital power either in the patient himself or the part injured, the degree of traumatism at the time of operation, or accidental injuries afterwards. Now we are assured that every case of suppuration depends upon infection of the wound. To quote the words of De Wecker: Aujourd'hui nous savons que toute suppuration de la cornee est due a une infection de la plaie. However that may be, it is certain that antiseptic solutions are a very valuable addition to the resources of the operating surgeon. What is the best antiseptic to use ? Well, bearing in mind the most important of all maxims in surgery,
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