Evening star., 1881-12-28
ANESTHETICS.
Iheir Uses Considered from a MedicO-
Legal Standpoint.

AcSA St0n0RO1mts
AN INTERESTING PAPER READ By DIR. JOHN G.
JOHNSON BEFORE THE NEW YORK MEDICO-LEGAI
SOCIETY.
From the Brooklyn Eagle
Dr. John G. johnson, Of this city, recently
read an interesting paper before the New York
Medlco-Legal Society on "Anesthetics" The
following are the main points of the doctors
statements:
ANEsTHETICs NEDTCo-LEGALLY CONSIDERED.
Mankind has, in all ages and in all clmes.
sought relief from pain. What reader of the
ooyssey" cannot call to mind the beautiful
Helen, driving away sad memories from the
niinds OF her husband and friends by making
them drink of the wine into which the sweet
nepenthe had been cast-that nepenthe that de-
hvered men from grief and wrath, and caused
oblivion to every ill. The effects of alcohol in
stupefying and overpowering the nervous sys-
TEN were known as far back as we can trace
the history of civilization. In the Bible we read
OF the daughters of Lot administering wine to
their father and entering in unto him. that the
human race might not die out. The Chinese
are known, so far back as their history can be
traced. to have used hasheesh. or Indian hemp,
to relieve pain of acupunoture Inhalation
of narcotics was known to the ancients.
Herodotus relates that the Scythians
were accustomed to produce intOXication
by inhaling the vapors of certain
KIND of hemp. The fertile plains of India pro-
duced the soporiferous poppy from which opium
was extracted, whose power of relief is so great
that it has Justly been called the great gift of the
gods to men. Among the Egyptians was an art
OF producing sleep by inhalation Plny de-
scrlbeS mineral brought from Memphis which,
When pulyerized and mixed with sour wine an
a
Larry, after the battle of Eylau found in the
wounded who required amputation remarkable
insenslbility, owing to the intense cold This
pein9 the first use of cold as an anesthetic. OF
all drugs known to the ancients mandragOra
wine undoubtedly was the most potent and eff
cient. Apulius states that half an ounce of this
preparation would render the patient insensible
10 even the pain OF amputatiOn. The wine,
mingled with myrrh. offered by the women to
the saviour on the cross. was undoubtedly this
iiiandragora. for it was common practice for
klnd.heaTted women to alleviate the horrible
agOnies OF those being crucified by the admins
tratlon OF this pain-defying drug. Or. B. W.
richardson, of London proved that this was
true He procured a specimen of mandragora
root which, though five centuries old, he made
OF II mandragora wine, and administered it to
ANIMALS, and found that it was a narcotic hayA
ing precisely the properties claimed for it. He
Iound that III animals it would produce the sleep
Oh juliet. not for forty hours, which must be
part but for four hours. as described by DiOsco-
rides VINO could have written Friar Lawrences s
description OF the wine that Juliet is to drink
unless he had seen its effects:
Through all thy veins shall run
A cold and drOwSy humOr, which shall
Seize each vital spirit; for no pulse shall keep
His natural progress, but surcease to beat;
n, No warmth no breath, shall testify thou livest;
Inc roses In thy lips and cheeks shall fade
TO paly ashes; thy eyes windows fall
Like death, when he shuts up the day OF life;
\ "a rf loRc,
Shall stiff, and stark. and cold appear like death:
And in this borrowed likeness of shrunk death
1no1 mo t snalt remain full two and forty hours,
Anu tEen awake as from pleasant Sleep"
But to our country and century is the world
indebted for the
DISCOVERY AND APPLICATION OF ANEsTHET1cs
for the purpose Of rendering persons insensible
under surgical operations. If America had con-
tributed nothing more than this to the stock of
human happiness, the world would owe her an
everlasting debt of gratitude The name of Nor
ton, OF Boston, will descend to pOsterity as a
benefactOr OF the human race. The benefaction he
mas conferred on suffering humanityin in the relief
OF pain being as great boon as those conferred
by those other Americans. Fulton who first applied
the steam engine to the navigation of vessels, and
whitney. who invented the cotton gin. have been
to the material prosperity ofthe world No one can
FORM, even at the present day, Just estimate of
the true value of the various anesthetics or ex-
4
plicatiOn to human suffering. To the surgeonit
gives the means Of operating and saving life in
grave cases, when before the discovery of anes-
thetics the shock rendered death inevitable. 1t
affords to the surgeon the means of manipula-
tlng the broken bones and injured parts with
facility. When without it the patient would be
Wrlthlng in agony. With aneSthetics correct
diagnosis can thus be made in the most obscure
| injuries and painful diseases. To the woman in
the pangs of labor it brings sweet relief to the
nd cha to
ment with the happy consciousness that she will
not suffer as her mother did. In the remOya
OF large tumors it affords relief to the shock
the most dreaded result of all operations. 1t
renders the eye insensible. so that it can be
touched with impunity. and the most delicate
operations performed on this sensitive organ
without pain and with far less risk while thus
suffering humanity is benefited incacula-
bly,. Still, the surgeon should remember every
time ne takes an anesthetic in his hand that he
is bringing his patient far down on the road to
death. when the slightest error on his part NAV
prevent return to life. Nor is this "a blessing un-
mixed with evil. Though it is to American den
fists that the world is indebted for anesthetics.
yet the dentists themselves have often had
To SUFFER AN AGONY
which has made some or them wish their profess
sion had never conferred this boon on humanity.
The surgeon or dentist should never administer
chlOrOform to a female patient unless some
other female is present and stays in the room
the whole time, from the commencement of the
inhalation to the restoration to full conscious
ness of the patient Although women more
often than men have their sufferings aleviated
by anesthetics, they have too often rewarded
the dentist with charges Of the most alarming
character and the dentist has been dragged
into the criminal courts to answer
DIR. Johnson then gave several instances of
women making serious charges against dentists
while under the influence of anesthetics. when
there was not the slightest ground for the accu-
SatiOn other than their own hallucinatiOns He
continued as follows:
DEATH UNDER ANEsTHEsIA.
Another medicO-legal point of interest to the
physician and also to the lawyer is the ques-
ton, what would be the effect OH the prisoners
case of patient dying from the effect of choro-
form administered for surgical purposes? To
make the question plain, suppose that the sur
geons should nave found the bullet in Presi-
dent Garield's case, and after consultation of
carefully skilled surgeons, it should have been
determined to put him under the influence of
chloroiorm to remove the bullet. and he had
died from the chlOrofOrm before the operation
had been commenced, would it relieve Guteau
from the charge Of murder? Under the old rule
Of law. unskiilful treatment on the part of the
attending surgeon did not relieve. even if it
could be shown that the treatment was unskill-
f,Ia fn1 In 6nnfh l,1Jxl