On the nature, pathology and treatment of puerperal convulsions / by Richard Hodges.

  • Hodges, Richard, 1820-1895.
Date:
1864
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the nature, pathology and treatment of puerperal convulsions / by Richard Hodges. 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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    slight eccentric causes of irritation, whether proceed- ing from the stomach, the intestines, the uterus, or any more distant part, readily induce convulsion, and it is this form which appears capable of being subdued by the inhalation of chloroform, chloroform possessing the power of restraining and arresting puerperal convul- sions, and, as it is thought by some, in virtue of its preventing the decomposition of urea into carbonate of ammonia. Whether this be the case or not I cannot say; but certain it is, that in these cases there is a pathological state of the blood induced, and which is frequently associated with convulsions; and if the various acts of secretion, nutrition, and depuration, so increased and altered by gestation, be considered, it cannot be surprising that pregnancy should strongly predispose to a morbid state of the blood, and particu- larly so if there be at the same time any disease of the kidneys materially interfering with their eliminating power. What the exact substance is which thus acts on the spinal nervous centre, I am not able to state; it may be urea, or carbonate of ammonia, or some other substance, or several operating in union; but whether it be this or that, it signifies little, for the means already advised and the careful administration of chlo- roform will prove, for the most part, effectual in re- ducing the excessive irritability of the spinal nervous centre, and in subduing the convulsions which are the necessary consequence of such excitability. From the foregoing remarks it will be inferred that I sanction the inhalation of chloroform chiefly, if not