On medicinal inhalations, with description of an improved apparatus for the production of medicated vapours / by James Adams, M.D.

  • Adams, James Maxwell, 1818-1899.
Date:
1868
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On medicinal inhalations, with description of an improved apparatus for the production of medicated vapours / by James Adams, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

    18/26 (page 14)
    (From the Glasgow Medical Journal, March, 1868j. MEDICO-CHIEUEGICAL SOCIETY. Meeting VI.—Session 1867-68. 7th February, 1868. Dr. Gairdner, Vice-President, in the Chair. Dr. Adams read a paper on Medicinal Inhalations, with description of an improved apparatus for the jjroduction of Medicated Vapouis. Dr. Adams placed before the Society a large number and variety of apparatus, used for medicinal inhalations,—including specimens of Siegels, Bergsons, Dewars, and the instrument constructed under his own directions. Dr. Adams also exhibited several of the apparatus in action, using perfumed instead of medicated liquids. Dr. Andrew Buchanan thanked Dr. Adams for bringing forward these interesting mechanical contrivances, and giving a brief histoiy of this increasingly important mode of medication, which he had no doubt would yet be apjDlied with very beneficial effects in diseases of the lungs and air passages. Of course the modes of application would require to be thoroughly tested, and that in the same spirit in which this had been done by Dr. Adams. He (Dr B.) had first made acquaintance with these new mechanical appliances through the instrumeu t of Dr. Dewar, wliich had been introduced to his notice by a very intelligent man, who stated to him that Dr. D. had taken a patent for it. He was surprised, however, on investigating the matter, that there was really nothing original in this patent of Dr. Dewar's except the gold points. Dr. Adams had told them that Dr. Dewar had been anticipated in the introduction of vulcanite in the instrument, by the manufacturers of that substance. This appeared to point decidedly to the fact that the present law of patent was essentially defective, when an instru,ment could be patented which in principle and detail had nothing original in it. Dr. Buchanan believed that the importance of this mode of treatment consisted in its bringing medicines directly to act upon the mucous membrane of the lungs. Formerly the only means they had of acting on this membrane was by expectorants, which were very uncertain in their operation, and could not therefore be depended on. The first step to the application of medicaments by inhalation was in the introduction of such substances as ether, chloroform &c., into the body through the lungs. By means of medicinal inhalation it was now possible to influence directly the pathological condition of the membrane of the lungs, through a mode never before thought of. The medicines were by this means introduced in a form so bland—the vapour or the nearest approximation to vapour was so finely divided, that the risk of injury was indefinitely lessened. Such a mode of application was precisely what was desiderated in an organ of such delicacy. He had tried sulphui-ous acid spray in a few cases of chronic bronchitis, and he had found it serviceable in some of these cases. Dr. Ritchie, after remarking on the great expenditure of time, thought, artistic talent, and money which it must have cost Dr. Adams to have brought his Spray Inhaler to its present perfection, said that it was to be reo^retted, however, tliat there did not exist more materials of a strictly professional kind on which to found an intelligent judgment of the utility of medicinal inhalation. This mode of curative treatment being indicated