THE NEW YORK JOURNAL OF PHARMACY 



ON SULPHUR OINTMENTS PRE- 

 PARED BY MELTING. 



By L. Sabl)atani. 



(Pharmacological Institute of the 

 Royal University at Padua.) 



Translated from Kolloid Zeitschrift 

 by Curt P. Wimmer. 



Sulphur ointments are usually pre- 

 pared by a thorough mixing of flowers 

 of sulphur or precrpitated sulphur with 

 vaseline, lard or lanolin ; sulphidal has 

 also been employed in recent years. 

 In the flowers of sulphur, the sulphur 

 is cr^^stalline ; in the precipitated sul- 

 phur it is amorphous and much more 

 finely subdivided ; sulphidal consists 

 of still smaller granules and contains 

 about 20% of albuminous substances. 

 These pharmaceutical preparations are, 

 technically, the more perfect the more 

 evenly the sulphur and base are mixed ; 

 they are, theoretically, the more active, 

 the more finely the sulphur is sub- 

 divided. This is the reason why, in 

 order to obtain a fine and well prepared 

 sulphur ointment, the solubility of 

 sulphur in fats was made use of. Such 

 ointments have not, as yet, been thor- 

 oughly studied from a chemico-phy- 

 sical nor a pharmacological point of 

 view. 



Take 100 gms. of vaseline and melt, 

 add 2 gms. of precipitated sulphur and 

 slowly increase the temperature with 

 constant shaking, to I40°-I45°, until 

 the sulphur is entirely liquified. Cool 

 the solution so that it solidifies quickly. 

 In this manner a sulphur ointment is 

 obtained by melting. 



A microscopical examination of the 

 ointment, consisting of vaseline and 

 2% of sulphur, made inimediately after 



the preparation shows exceedingly 

 small, round sulphur granules, meas- 

 uring from 0.7 to 1.1« evenly subdi- 

 uring froiti 0.7 to i.iy evenly subdi- 

 vided in the masses of vaseline cry.s- 

 tals. 



A 2% sulphur ointment prepared 

 with lard in a manner alike to the pre- 

 vious one and examined immediately 

 with the microscope shows the sul- 

 phur granules measuring from 1.5 to 

 6.6«. 



An ointment prepared with cacao 

 butter shows the sulphur granules oi 

 about the same size as in the ointment 

 prepared with lard. In an ointment 

 prepared in the usual manner, consist- 

 ing of 2% sulphur and white wax, the 

 granules are very small, about 0.5 to 

 0.7u. In an ointment prepared with 

 lanolin iri the usual manner, no trace 

 of sulphur granules can be detected 

 with highest magnification, immedi- 

 ately after the preparation. A thin 

 film of it enclosed between cover 

 glasses shows a slight opalescence, 

 while the other ointments which con- 

 tain sulphur in form of smallest gran- 

 ules, appear white and milky. With 

 lanolin, the granules form slowly and 

 become visible after an hour ; first one 

 by one and very small, then more nu- 

 merous and somewhat large. After 

 a few hours the ointment becomes 

 similar to the others as far as number 

 and subdivision of the granules is con- 

 cerned, only the granules are very 

 much smaller. They cannot be meas- 

 ured with accuracy ; but they measure 

 approximately 0.2 to 0:ou. 



An ointment of 2% of sulphur in 

 spermaceti shows immediately after 

 cooling sulphur particles and granules 

 of dififerent sizes, but mainly larger 



