On potassium permanganate as an antidote to vegetable poisons / by H.C. Wood.

  • Wood, Horatio Curtis, 1841-1920.
Date:
1894
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On potassium permanganate as an antidote to vegetable poisons / by H.C. Wood. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    perfect, antidote to the morphine salts ; an antidote, however, which should not be relied upon to the exclusion of emptying the stomach by medicinal or mechanical means. Section B. I do not know that it has been claimed in type by any American observer that the potassium permanganate is capable of following an organic poison into the blood and there acting upon it, although I was recently surprised to find in New York City the wide-spread belief in the existence of such action, so that tablets of the potassium perman- ganate are furnished for hypodermic use. Further, Schlagdenhauffen and Reeb distinctly claim that the permanganate has the power of being absorbed and acting upon the poison which has been previously taken into the blood. The avidity with which potassium permanganate attacks all kinds of organic matters, living or dead, strongly militates against its capability of absorption into the blood, and I have always believed that such absorption was impossible. Nevertheless, it is necessary to test by experiment this ct priori reasoning in order to arrive at positive conclusions. Experiments were therefore made upon pigeons in which a morphine sulphate and potassium permanganate were given hypodermically. No. Morphine solution, 8 per cent. Permanganate solution, 4 per cent. Result. i control 2.0 C.C. None Recovery. 2 2.0 C.C. 2 C.C. Death in one hour and forty minutes. 3 2.0 C.C. 4 c.c. Death in one hour and sixteen minutes. 4 control 2.5 C.C. None Death in twenty-two minutes ; pigeon very young. 5 control 2.5 C.C. None Recovery after some tetanus ; old pigeon. 6 2.5 C.C. 5 c.c. Death in fifty six minutes. 7 2.5 C.C. 5 c.c. Death ; time not known. Upon rabbits two experiments were performed with solutions and in a manner precisely like those just described. No. Weight. Morphine solution. Permanganate solution. Result. 8 control 1% lbs. 4 C.C. None Death in one hour and forty-two minutes. 9 I lb. 4 c.c. S c.c. Death in one hour and eight minutes.