Miscellaneous.

If no other antidote is to be had, a solution of common soap drunk immediately, will perfectly antidote carbolic acid.

It is said that if alcohol is burnt with a Welsbach mantel it gives a much better light than gas and almost equals electricity.

Where a small piece of ovarian tissue is left from removal of both ovaries menstruation may continue uninterrupted for a normal period.

The persistent use of extreme doses of salicylic acid for rheumatism, has induced severe hemorrhage of the nose, gums, retina, or kidneys.

There are certain cases of hemoptysis which will be very quickly relieved by giving three or four drops of cactus every twenty or thirty minutes.

Vesication over the fourth and fifth dorsal vertebra, was advised by an English writer some years ago, as an infallible cure for vomiting of pregnancy.

Dysmenorrhea is often accompanied, especially in weak, nervous women, with palpitation, which frequent small doses of cactus will speedily relieve.

Bert, of Brussels, claimed that in the diagnosis of severe chronic disease of the stomach, cancer could be excluded if there was no edema of the ankles.

There are occasional cases of gonorrheal epididymitis which can be successfully cured, with fifteen minim doses of the tincture of pulsatilla, every three or four hours.

The fluid extract of geranium given internally will control passive hemorrhage. Applied directly it controls hemorrhage from a tooth, nose bleeding and other simple local hemorrhages.

If twenty drops of the fluid extract of belladonna be mixed with an ounce of glycerin and this be applied on a compress over the swollen glands it will quickly relieve the pain in parotitis.

A writer claims that in cases of hay fever if a slight cut be made in the lower border of the interior turbinated bone, and some hemorrhage encouraged, there will be immediate relief of the nasal symptoms.

A common fault, noticeable among some surgeons, is that of wasting time after anesthesia is induced in a patient, puttering and unnecessary attention to useless detail., or no attention to the patient.

Sternburg investigating yellow fever when he was surgeon general cured twelve cases by the use of strong solution of bicarbonate of soda, with the 1/100 of a grain of corrosive sublimate.

In the early stage of heart disease in children with a rheumatic tendency there are aching pains which are classed as growing pains. This will be a fatal mistake if the condition of the heart is overlooked.

It is said that in the Island of Skye, from which skye terriers are brought, hydrophobia is prevented and cured by an infusion of stramonium. The infusion is made very strong and is given in large quantities.

In the treatment of croup, whooping cough, and hiccough an excellent auxiliary to any method of treatment is the use of small doses of jaborandi frequently repeated. Some physicians use pilocarpine instead, and claim the same results.

A reasonably sure method to determine the presence of morphine in the system, is to drop a few drops of the tincture of the perchloride of iron into the urine. If morphine is being eliminated a characteristic blue tint will show itself.

A proper distribution of normal physical exercise, between the periods, and the avoidance of toxemia and rest in bed, at the time of the period, is of great advantage. To these measures may be added the proper use of the specific remedies adapted to precise existing conditions.

When urine has been retained in large quantity, for eighteen, twenty or more hours, not more than one-half the quantity should be withdrawn at once. Collapse has followed the sudden withdrawal of the whole quantity. The remainder may be withdrawn half an hour later.

Common sense on the part of the doctor is an unusual but essential trait. If he be possessed with it he is willing to save life in any way. He acknowledges no boundary, no sect, no school. He draws from every other source. He searches heaven and earth, if necessary, to find that which will most quickly relieve his patient.

Loss of appetite, we are apt to claim, is due to faults of the stomach alone. This is usually a mistake. Hunger originates in the structures of the body and is caused by the demand of these structures for nutrition. lf the stomach were removed, hunger might yet exist. On the other hand with many animals hunger is present when the stomach is full of food.

Dysmenorrhea has an often unrecognized cause, as has also other menstrual disturbance, in the physical inactivity and irregularity of city life. The lowered vitality from deficient strength, of the structures of the organs, are to blame for headaches, nervous symptoms, and pain, during the period. These cause subnormal temperature at times, while autotoxemia may induce a menstrual fever.

While hematuria is usually not difficult to control there is occasionally a case which is not amenable to the usual treatment. There is no one remedy that will benefit every case, but we have quite a number of accessible remedies. Mitchell in his writings advises five drops of the tincture of bursa pastoris four or five times a day, as a remedy for those cases which present no typical phenomena.

I have long been convinced that the regularly recurring severe pain of labor, itself, prevents accidents from the use of chloroform at that time. On several occasions I have seen every evidence of the approach of alarming symptoms between the pains, when upon the natural recurrence of the pain, or upon irritation of the fundus uteri which immediately produced contraction, the severe chloroform symptoms would immediately disappear.

Statistics have been collected of forty thousand cases of anesthesia with nitrous oxide gas combined with oxygen, where the gases were given warm, in which there was Dot a single fatality. If this includes all cases without regard to conditions it is certainly a strong argument in favor of this method of producing anesthesia. The author of the paper believes that all anesthetics should be warmed to the temperature of the body before administration.

A homeopathic authority claims that he has obtained excellent results from the use of balsam of peru, administered in the first stage of pulmonary tuberculosis. The cases in which he has obtained the best results, are those in which there was expectorated a large quantity of pus, with an excessively fetid odor. His method of prescribing was to dissolve twenty drops of the balsam in an ounce of alcohol and to give five drops of this four times a day on sugar. This changed the character of the sputum most materially, but did not greatly influence the course of the disease.

Neurasthenia has become quite common in adults in the cities, but it is often overlooked in children. Wilson says, that it is founded essentially on a lower nutrition of the nervous system and perhaps also on one and all of the tissues and systems of the body such as the bony system, muscular system the nervous system and the circulatory system. The probabilities are that the fault of the latter is due to underlying nerve disorder. The difficulty in inducing a rapid recovery is that, because of functional disorder of these organs, the nutrition which is carried to the blood, and the lymph, is diminished or materially altered, and is in every way insufficient.

Ellingwood's Therapeutist, Vol. 2, 1908, was edited by Finley Ellingwood M.D.