On the antagonism between medicines and between remedies and diseases : being the Cartwright Lectures for the year 1880 / by Roberts Bartholow.

  • Bartholow, Roberts, 1831-1904.
Date:
1881
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the antagonism between medicines and between remedies and diseases : being the Cartwright Lectures for the year 1880 / by Roberts Bartholow. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    68/148 (page 62)
    effects, taking a general view, are as follows : Considerable gastro- intestinal disturbance, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhoea, and violent colic, due to a tetanic contraction of the muscular layer of the bowel, are produced by it. An active and rather pleasurable delirium, rambling, and incoherence, not unlike that of alcohol, are caused by the fungus, so that it is used as an intoxicant by some of the in- habitants of eastern Asia. In toxic doses, the excitement is followed by more or less profound stupor, epileptiform attacks, trismus, and abolition of all reflex movements. During the stage of pleasurable intoxication, the pupil is contracted, vision is dim, objects are seen as through a mist, and also, probably, double. The action of the heart is weakened and finally arrested in the diastole, the respiration is labored and stertorous, the salivary secretion is increased, the surface of the body becomes cold, and death ensues from failure of the heart. On the brain, it is probable that muscaria acts in two modes, directly and indirectly; it first excites the cells of the gray matter, and ultimately paralyzes them ; the heart being weakened, less blood passes to the brain, and hence this organ is in a condition of ansemia. On the eye, muscarin produces peculiar effects. It causes spasm of the accommodation, and a marked degree of myosis, by stimula- tion of the motor oculi. The vision is disturbed, therefore, by the spasm of the accommodative apparatus, and by the myosis, which limits the amount of light admitted to the retina. The secretions generally are increased by muscarin, but it espe- cially stimulates the salivary secretion. According to Prevost,* the bile and the pancreatic and urinary secretions are increased. It promotes the salivary secretion by stimulating the end organs of the nerves, and this is independent of a centric influence, for it takes place after the trunks of the nerves have been divided.f It is probable, if Prevost’s view is correct, that the increase of the other secretions is due to the same mode of action. A slight and momentary increase in the cardiac movements is first produced by muscarin, but this is followed by retardation. Direct application of this agent arrests the heart in the diastole, but mechanical, chemical, or electrical irritation will induce con- traction. Section of the vagi does not prevent this effect. It may therefore be concluded that muscarin acts on the motor ganglia in * “Gaz. M6d. de Paris,” 1870, iii, p. 243. f F. A. Falck, “Dcr Antagonisms d. Gifte.” Volkmann’s “Samml. khn. Vortr., No. 159, 1879.