Remarks on the alleged fatal case of chloroform-inhalation.

  • Simpson, James Young, 1811-1870.
Date:
[1848]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Remarks on the alleged fatal case of chloroform-inhalation. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    JV/ 5 one and all of them, exactly the special morbid appearances ob- served in the bodies of patients who have died of simple asphyxia. But it is important to add, that while the morbid appearances in Mr Meggison's patient were precisely those seen to result from pure asphyxia, these morbid appearances were, on the other hand, different in some essential points from the morbid appearances seen on the bodies of animals intentionally killed by the inhalation of chloro- form. About two months ago, I witnessed a series of experiments, made by a Committee of the Medico-chirurgical Society of Edin- burgh, on several animals poisoned with fatal doses of chloroform. In Mr Meggison's patient, the blood found in the heart was dark'' and fluid. On the contrary, in the fatal experiments to which I allude, firm coagula of blood were found in every case where chloroform was inhaled!1 In some the lungs were congested; in others, quite healthy. In none did we find the brain con- gested, as in Mr Meggison's patient. Besides, the dose of chloroform exhibited by Mr Meggison was so small, as to render it exceedingly improbable that it could have been the essential cause of the death of the patient. Altogether, then, while it thus appears highly improbable that the fatal result in Mr Meggison's patient could be the effect of the use of chloroform, the conditions in which the patient was placed were such as would almost inevitably have produced death by asphyxia. The morbid appearances were not those rosulting from chloroform ; they were those resulting from asphyxia. And, as I have already stated, the verdict should not have been died from the effects of chloroform, but died from the effects of means used to restore her from the state of anaesthesia. In making this last remark, and coming to this self-evident conclusion, I have no desire to throw any, the very slightest, blame upon Mr Meggison. Notbing could be possibly further from my wishes and intentions. On the contrary, I take very great blame to myself for not publishing sooner, as I intended, a suggestion to my professional brethren, to guard them against this source of danger in the treatment of chloroformed, or apath- ized patients. To point to it, as I have now done, will, how- ever, I hope, be sufficient. And I will merely add, that I sin- cerely believe, from all that I have seen, that in such a case as Mr Meggison's patient, nothing whatever requires to be done but the removal of the handkerchief or inhaler, and the free admission of air to the face of the patient, If aught else is to be attempted, it 1 See Dr Bennett's report on the subject in the Monthly Journal of Medi- cal Science for January 184S, p. 539.