ANESTHETIC 



ANESTHETIC 



ANESTHETIC, anesthet'ik, (classical 

 form, anaesthetic), a medicine or other agent 

 which, because of its power to destroy the 

 sense of pain, is to be counted among the 

 greatest blessings of suffering humanity. The 

 word was first used by Dr. Oliver Wendell 

 Holmes, and comes from anesthesia, which 

 means loss oj feeling. Up to the year 1800, 

 when Sir Humphry Davy suggested that laugh- 

 ing gas (nitrous oxide) could be used in sur- 

 gical operations, little was known about anes- 

 tli. tics, though opium had been used for cen- 

 turies to deaden unbearable pain, and often 

 with tragic results. Sir Humphry's experi- 

 ments were the beginning of a new era in the 

 history of medicine. In 1844 Dr. H. Wells, 

 an American dentist, successfully used laugh- 

 ing gas in pulling teeth, and two years later 

 W. T. G. Morton, a Boston dentist, brought 

 r into general use as an anesthetic. In 

 1848, Sir James Y. Simpson, a Scotch physi- 

 cian, made known the anesthetic value of 

 chloroform, and since then marvelous progress 

 has been made in this branch of medical 

 practice. 



General and Local Anesthetics. There are 

 two groups of anesthetics, general and local. 

 The former cause the patient to lose con- 

 sciousness, and are of untold value in what 

 are known as the " major operations." The 

 general anesthetics most commonly used at the 

 present time are nitrous oxide, ether, chloro- 

 form and mixtures of two or more of these. 

 Doctors have made many experiments to dis- 

 cover the special effects and virtues of these 

 ilruRs. Ether produces disagreeable after- 

 effects, chiefly intense nausea, but is consid- 

 ered safer than chloroform. Modern refine- 

 ments in methods of administering ether prom- 

 ise to obviate the worst of these evils. Nitrous 

 oxide is useful in dental work and minor oper- 

 ations where the patient need not remain in- 

 sensible for more than a few minutes. This 

 anesthetic has no disagreeable after-effects. 

 Experiments in anesthetics are being made 

 continually and their use is constantly being 

 widened. Physicians are also working on the 

 problem of lessening the shock to the nervous 

 system, a great danger in all operations. 



Local anesthetics destroy the sense of feel- 

 inu in that portion of the body to be operated 

 upon. t>ut the patient does not low conscious- 

 ness. Ice and various freezing mixtures have 

 loim tx n used for this purpose, as well as the 

 ether spray introduced by Sir Benjamin Rich- 

 ardson, which chills and freezes the tissues by 



the rapid evaporation of ether. The most 

 important agent for producing local anesthesia, 

 especially in mucous membranes, is cocaine, 

 or one of the various drugs derived from it. 

 These drugs are sometimes sprayed upon the 

 surface to be operated upon, and sometimes 

 they are injected into the tissues. Delicate 

 operations on the eye, ear and throat are made 

 possible by the use of cocaine or its allied 

 drugs, and these anesthetics are widely used 

 in dental work. 



The most important development in many 

 years in this branch of surgery, however, is 

 the perfection of an apparatus for adminis- 

 tering a mixture of nitrous oxide and oxygen 

 for difficult or painful operations, especially the 

 extraction of teeth, which removes from the 

 latter operation all of its old-time terror. By 

 varying the proportion of the two gases the 

 patient may remain perfectly conscious and 

 yet feel no pain or he may be rendered un- 

 conscious, according to the will of the opera- 

 tor. There are no ill after-effects; the pres- 

 ence of oxygen stimulates the patient while 

 under the influence of the mixture. 



Midway between general and local anesthe- 

 sia is regional anesthesia, in which conscious- 

 ness is retained, but a large area of the body 

 becomes insensible. A very interesting exam- 

 ple of this is spinal anesthesia, which is brought 

 about by injecting the proper drug into the 

 sac which contains the fluid that surrounds 

 the spinal cord. As a result the patient ceases 

 to have any feeling in that part of the body 

 below the point of injection. Physicians do 

 not fully agree as to the merits of spinal anes- 

 thesia, though many successful operations of 

 this nature have been performed. The future 

 promises remarkable discoveries in this par- 

 ticular field. 



Their Use in War. Anesthetics rank high 

 among the agents that serve to lessen the 

 horror of modern warfare, but it is impossible 

 to have them available at all times, especially 

 when the scene of military operation extends 

 over many miles. Early in the War of the 

 Nations, that set all Europe aflame in 1914, it 

 was impossible always to procure anesthetics, 

 particularly chloroform, in sufficient quantities, 

 and many operations were performed without 

 the use of these merciful agents. With the 

 ction of their hospital facilities the na- 

 tions at war greatly remedied this state of 

 affairs. 



Twilight Sleep. This is the popular name 

 for a condition resulting from the use of certain 



