Directions for the treatment of persons who have taken poison, and those in a state of apparent death; together with the means of detecting poisons and adulterations in wine; also of distinguishing real from apparent death / by M.P. Orfila. Translated from the French / by R.H. Black ... With an appendix, on suspended animation.

  • Orfila, Matthieu Joseph Bonaventure, 1787-1853
Date:
1818
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Directions for the treatment of persons who have taken poison, and those in a state of apparent death; together with the means of detecting poisons and adulterations in wine; also of distinguishing real from apparent death / by M.P. Orfila. Translated from the French / by R.H. Black ... With an appendix, on suspended animation. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    4 •# 31 Considerations on the employment of Arsenical Preparations. 19. Surgeons have long been in the habit of using arsenical caustics in cases of cancer; experience proves however that injudiciously used they may cause death in twenty-four or forty-eight hours. The greatest precaution is therefore ne- cessary in the employment of these pre- parations. Swallowed even in extremely minute doses, compounds of arsenic are energetic poisons, which do not cause death by the inflammation they excite in the stomach and intestines, as is generally supposed, but because they are absorbed, and destroy the vital properties of the heart. Frequently this organ is inflamed and ulcerated. These facts being grant- ed, can we flatter ourselves with obtain- ing any permanent advantage from the use of arsenic in intermittent fevers, &c., as some medical men have thought, who have administered this medicine at differ- ent times ? We believe it is dangerous to c 4 I