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.

    89/106 page 85
    eye, and when she came here both cornea had sloughed. She was a widow, forty years of age, strong, active, fond of work, and had two children dependent -upon her. Think of it I— hopelessly blind for life; and all for want of a bit of sticking plaister which any country druggist might have applied just as well as the most accomplished surgeon. With regard to the treatment of gonorrhoeal ophthalmia, '* Dreadful diseases require dreadful remedies, and if you are to succeed you must be instant in their application. I usually apply leeches by the handful, pack the eye with ice, and, unless there is some contra-indication, keep it constantly applied, slit the outer canthus, incise and excise (if necessary) portions of the chemosed conjunctiva, and get the patient rapidly under the influence of mercury. During the crudes- cence of the disease, and when it is at its height,—that is, during the first forty-eight hours, or while the discharge is serous,—strong caustics are out of place; but you may keep the eye saturated with weak solution of chloride of zinc or i per cent.)* from the beginning, and as soon as the serous discharge becomes purulent, apply as well once or twice daily to the inside of the everted lids, a two to four per cent, solution of nitrate of silver, carefully protecting the eye by neutraliza- tion with milk, or saline solution. I have saved some eyes in this way, but occasionally the cornea will slough in twenty- four hours, and then all you can do for the patient, and that is everything, is to protect the sound eye from inoculation. * I consider the constant application of these solutions of the utmost importance. Dr. Colles, of Dublin, wi-iting in the Dublin Quarterly/, vol. 35, page 5, declares that he has been singularly successful iu cases of gonorrhoeal ophthalmia with solution of nitrate of sUver, A grain to the ounce, injected eveiy ten minutes for twenty four hours ; afterwards the strength is increased to ^ grain to the ounce, and is injected every half-hour.
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