Lectures on general anaesthetics in dentistry : advocating painless dental operations by the use of nitrous oxid, nitrous oxid and oxygen, chloroform analgesia, ethyl chloride and somnoform / by William H. De Ford.

  • De Ford, William Harper, 1858-
Date:
[1908], [©1908]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Lectures on general anaesthetics in dentistry : advocating painless dental operations by the use of nitrous oxid, nitrous oxid and oxygen, chloroform analgesia, ethyl chloride and somnoform / by William H. De Ford. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    In the graver cases, partial or complete inversion of the patient was first advocated by Nealton. Schuppert claims to have saved three patients by inversion. Oth- ers report remarkable success accompanying inversio'n. The argument is that respiratory action is stimulated by an increased cerebral blood supply. If this measure fails, massaging the muscles over the heart may be resorted to. This may be done as an adjunct to the Silvester method of artificial respiration. If a second party be present, the muscles over the heart may be massaged at the time that artificial respiration is progressing. Drugs are of little if any service in cases of this class, and if employed should be administered, not by the anaesthetist, but by some other person present. The anaesthetist's undivided attention must be devoted to maintaining efficient artificial respiration and a proper posture. To commence the treatment of a marked case of syncope by a hypodermic injection of ether or brandy is not only useless (seeing that the circulation is more or less suspended) but dangerous, in that such a procedure delays the application of artificial respira- tion, the remedial measure by which the elimination of the anaesthetic and aeration of the blood are affected and the measure of all others which is most likely to increase cardiac action. There is, of course, no objec- tion to the employment, by sortie other person than the anaesthetist, of such drugs as ammonia, nitrate of amyl, strychnine, or caffine; but these substances should only be used as adjuncts, and in the manner described. (Hewitt.)