Treatise on acupuncturation, inoculation, diversion, and direct medical administration / by A.R. Brown ; vol. II.

  • Brown, A. R., active 19th century.
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Treatise on acupuncturation, inoculation, diversion, and direct medical administration / by A.R. Brown ; vol. II. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    The most common local irritants in use, then, are : 1. Mustard. This is usually selected or preferred because so easily procured, is speedy and thorough in action, and safe in results. The objections to its use, are first; it is a disagreeable and dauby agent. Second- ly, in general, its severity, when properly prepared and applied, is so great that it is not liable to to be con- tinued long enough to cause a permanent diversion ; and it is not suitable to be left on long enough to ves- sicate, on account of the difficulty in healing a blister so produced. 2. Cantharides, or Spanish flies, is the next in im- portance as being in common use, in various forms of preparation, the most frequent of which is that of the emplastrum cantharides, vessicatorice compositum (the common blistering plaster). This is used to follow up and maintain an action already begun with more active counter irritants, but its action is not of suffi- cient duration to secure permanent results; or it is frequently employed alone when the case is more chronic than otherwise, and very speedy measures are not required. Objections. It is not momentarily active enough in many cases. Draws the serum from the blood, and causes great temporary debility. Is apt to affect the urinary organs by absorption of cantharidine. Makes a very unpleasant and offensive sore, is often hard to heal, and not unfrequently followed by bad swellings. Who does not know the disagreeable character of a • fly blister ? 3. Stimulating Liniments. Owing to the variable condition of the skin their effects are always uncer- tain.