t84 clinical VKTERINAKY .MEDICINE AND SURGERY. 



They are also recommended where suppuration or gangrene is feared, 

 and can be given in electuary in daily doses of one and a half to four 

 drachms. 



Sulphate of soda in doses of three to six ounces stimulates the 

 intestinal secretion and favours free circulation of digested material. 

 During the early febrile and hepatisation periods it is given like the 

 bicarbonate in drinking-water or mashes. 



Cold enemas to diminish constipation and fever, nourishing enemas 

 to sustain the bodily strength when ordinary food is refused, and anti- 

 septic enemas to prevent or limit suppuration or pulmonary gangrene, 

 are also measures deserving of attention. 



Suppuration and pulmonary gangrene, as I have said, almost always 

 prove fatal. An abscess formed in the midst of pulmonary tissue may 

 under exceptional circumstances open into a bronchus, its contents 

 become evacuated and its walls cicatrised : a gangrenous fragment may 

 similarly be got rid of or may become encysted, the patient in either 

 case surviving ; but such endings are rare, and treatment is of little 

 value. The patient's strength must be supported by milk, hay tea, 

 and fluid nourishment to which has been added alcohol. Antiseptics 

 are employed in the form of fumigations, intra-tracheal, subcutaneous, 

 or intra-venous injections. Solutions of iodine or carbolic acid are 

 often administered by the last method. Direct injection of antiseptics 

 into the gangrenous centres has been little used in the horse, and on 

 the several occasions I have performed it the result was unsatisfactory. 

 Puncture of a purulent or gangrenous centre through the thoracic wall, 

 followed by evacuation of the contents and drainage of the cavity, has 

 been attempted as a last resource where the diseased lung was adherent 

 to the wall of the chest. 



