Hydrate of chloral / by Charles W. Parsons.

  • Parsons, Charles W. (Charles William), 1823-1893.
Date:
1872
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hydrate of chloral / by Charles W. Parsons. 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.

    27/30 (page 23)
    In an epidemic of cholera at Riga, chloral was used suc- cessfully to relieve cramps at the beginning, to assuage praecordial suffering, to arrest vomiting and procure sleep. In one case where death seemed imminent, a drachm of chloral was giving with only four drachms of water. Sleep began in a few minutes and lasted three hours ; after which breathing was easier, the warmth and fullness of surface re- turned, vomiting and purging ceased, and the patient got well. Although chloral given without sufficient dilution may irritate the stomach as well as burn in the throat, still it has some power, after its absorption into the blood, to quiet vomit- ing. It obviously had that effect, when introduced by enema, in the case of a lady very much prostrated by vomiting and pain, to whose history I have already referred. In the Lancet for September, is a case reported of chronic obstruction of thie bowels, with stercoraceous vomiting, in which the first liquid retained was a solution of chloral, (25 grains in half an ounce), which checked the vomiting, after which copious enemata acted successfully.