Letters to a mother on the watchful care of her infant.

Date:
1831
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Letters to a mother on the watchful care of her infant. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    140/160 (page 128)
    The morbid effects of opiates or ano- dynes* are seen as the consequence of a single dose, or of the habit of giving these medicines. Infants are very susceptible of the effects of the first dose of an opiate. Dozing, and then perhaps con- vulsion, takes place; the infant lies with the eyes partially closed, and turned upwards; the breathing is laborious and sighing; there is some tossing about of the arms perhaps; and the powers of life begin to sink. The appearances which arise from the habit of giving opiates are very peculiar. They may be seen in the dwindled, pallid, sallow, stupefied countenances of the infants of the poor, as you pass them in the street. The eye-lids are red and swollen; the whole face is the miniature of a sickly aged person.