The metric system in medicine and pharmacy / by T.B. Curtis.

  • Curtis, T. B. (Thomas B.), 1842-1881.
Date:
[1877?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The metric system in medicine and pharmacy / by T.B. Curtis. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    The Tntrodxirtio^al^fi Internation\l Decimal Welqlits and AffasuresS ^muKiiiiii'W111 nwmmiimr™- \ AMERICAN METRIC BUREAU. GENERAL OFFICES, 7 AND 8, SECOND STORY, 32 IIAWLEY STREET, BOSTON. * Circular 22. — The following article is issued separately for distribution as Circular 22, and will be sent to any physician applying. The author is the Chairman of the Bureau Committee on this subject. A brief circular, with equivalents, dangerous doses, etc., a new edition of the leaflet distrib- uted last year, will soon be ready, and will be sent with this. This article is reprinted from the plates of the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, and the old spelling, gramme, was then followed. Gram is now almost universally accepted as the correct spelling. claimed for the metric system of weights and measures. These, briefly enumerated, are: uniformity ; simplicity ; the decimal character; the fact that the various units have definite and readily apprehended rela- tions to each other ; a nomenclature which is self-defining and express- ive of values ; and, finally, security, the base being unalterable. We also know the objections which have been raised against the pro- posed introduction of the metric system, and we have probably all been struck by the trivial and irrelevant character of several of them. The only objection which appears to me to possess any weight at all is one upon which our opponents habitually lay but little stress; yet it must be admitted that it has great force and deserves very careful consid- eration. I refer to the trouble and labor unavoidably attending any change of weights and measures. Routine, proceeding from traditions and habits of long standing and of numerous and complex ramifications, is firmly established. Is it worth our while to try to overcome the in- ertia of this routine ? What are the inducements for us, whose main interest in the question is connected with the handling of drugs, to take a leading part in the proposed reform ? In answer to this question I intend to pass in review, from the stand-point of the physician, certain advantages which can be claimed for the new system, and also to con- sider certain objections which have been brought forward by physicians against it. First, it should be understood that the adoption of the metric system as used in Europe involves two separate and wholly independent inno- vations, consisting, primarily, in the substitution of a new system of weights and measures, with its nomenclature, for our present system ; and, secondly, in the substitution of gravimetric methods for the sys- tem, partly gravimetric and partly volumetric, now in use. With regard, in the first place, to the new system of weights and measures called the metric, this system recommends itself by several manifest merits. The advantage of uniformity with the usages estab- I Read before the Suffolk District Medical Society, March 31, 1877.