Experiments and observations on the means of counteracting the deleterious effects of opium : and on the method of cure of the disease resulting therefrom / by Franklin Scott.

  • Scott, Franklin.
Date:
1803
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Experiments and observations on the means of counteracting the deleterious effects of opium : and on the method of cure of the disease resulting therefrom / by Franklin Scott. 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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    pupils dilated; they appear towards the last, of a muddy aspect, or of a pearly white. Finally, the pulse becoming more slow, and intermitting, is at last imperceptible; the circulation retires from the surface, the skin is livid, and feels coldj singultus; sighing, and sobbing; a paralytic re- laxation over the whole body; and respiration being made at intervals of several minutes, the unhappy patient breathes his last, with most of the phenomena of apoplexy. When the disease appears, with the above mentioned symp- toms, it has been considered a true apoplexy. Dr. Cullen has called it apoplexia venenosa when arising from Opium, cicuta, fixed air, or drunkenness. That Opium produces death, in a majority of cases, from the injury done to the system of the brain, may be inferred. 1st. From the symptoms most generally occurring, being similar to those where the brain is supposed to be principally affected: such as dilatation of the pupil of the eyes, a slow and intermitting pulse, a stertorous and difficult respiration, tremors, subsultus tendinum, and paralysis. 2nd. In those countries where it is used as an article of luxury, those who take it to excess are affected with tremors, paralytic affections of the lower extremities, which travellers have compared to the rickets. 3dly. From the morbid appearances in the brain, upon dissection, the meninges of the brain have been generally found preternaturally turgid with blood, and instances are not rare where extravasation or effusion has been found in its cavities. Ancient writers speak of the vessels of the brain being ruptured by the effects of Opium. Dr. Cooper once made a dissection of the brain of a patient, who died in consequence of taking a large dose of Opium, (as I was informed by Dr. Barton), and found a very considerable quantity of bloody serum in the ventricles. The opinion of Lassus, in the'case mentioned, is a very singular one. He confesses that when he first saw the patient, she wa*