Vol. XXV. No. 4.] 
POPULAE SCIEl^CE ITEWS. 
61 
aud the eyes are destroyed. A pitiable sight — for 
tliese children do uot die, but grow to manhood 
aud womanhood totally blind ! 
The treatmeut is both preventive aud curative. 
The first indication is prevention. AVhenever there 
have occurred profuse discharges of a specific 
nature previous to the child's birth, the greatest 
care should be exercised to prevent infection of 
tlie child's eyes. Injections of a mild corrosive 
sublimate solution (one part of the sublimate in 
from three to five thousand parts of water) should 
lie given during the first stage of labor, and the 
child should be delivered as quickly as possible 
after its head has entered the pelvis. As soon as 
tlie child is born its eyes should be thoroughly 
cleansed with warm water, and one or two droi)s 
of a two per cent, solution of nitrate of silver 
should be dropped into them, and clean cloths 
rung out in ice-cold water should be laid over the 
closed lids occasionally during the first day. As a 
rule, it is wise in all cases for a competent attend- 
ant to carefully wash the infant's eyes with warm 
water directly after birth and from time to time 
for a few days — the sponges, towels, cloths, etc., 
I mploycd lieiug jjerfectly clean and used for no 
other purpose, and the hands of the attendant 
cleansed each time before these ablutions are 
made. 
By these means ophthalmia can be avoided in 
most cases, but if prophylaxis fails and the symp- 
toms already described come on, active curative 
measures must be at once instituted. In a general 
way, until the discharge is distinctly purulent, 
tlie more simple and non-irritating the treatment 
I he better the results. Cleanliness is of the first 
importance — more valuable than all else. The 
iliscbarge In severe cases is excessively irritating, 
and its frequent removal is therefore an urgent 
indication. For this purpose a solution of boric 
acid (a teaspoonful of the powder dissolved in a 
liint of water) should be used every half hour or 
'iftener, both day and night. The pus should l)e, 
IS far as possible, removed, and the solution 
-liould come in contact with the infiamed con- 
Jimctiva. This, as well as other mildly astringent 
solutions, w ill cure the mild or non-purulent in- 
fantile conjunctivitis. Pure vaseline may be 
smeared on tlie edges of the lids to pi-event their 
slicking together. If the case should prove ob- 
stinate, a one per cent, solution of nitrate of silver 
may be applied to the well-everted lids with a 
camers-hair brush, two or three applications in 
I he course of as many days being all that is re- 
quired to effect a cure. Whenever there is much 
swelling of the lids, cold cloths, occasionally ap- 
plied, are in order. 
Tlie true specific or purulent conjunctivitis re- 
iiuires most careful attention, aud its rational and 
successful treatment is not only beyond the ken 
of domestic medicine, but occasionally these cases 
are — either through carelessness or ignorance — 
neglected by the general practitioner of medicine. 
it is such a dangerous affection, especially when 
neglected, that any discharge from the eye of a 
very young baby should at once receive careful 
attention. Owing to the little power of resistance 
of the cornea of such young children, serious com- 
plications frequently occur, even during the ear- 
liest stages of the disease. Protection of the sec- 
ond eye, if both are not affected at the same time, 
is a matter of great importance, and also of great 
ilitficulty, on account of the age and restlessness 
of the little patient. In addition to the free use 
of the boric acid solution, ice-cold cloths should 
be applied to the lids for fifteen or twenty minutes 
tlirough the day and the night, and a one or two 
per cent, solution of nitrate of silver should be 
applied to the everted lids, pro re nata, by the sur- 
geon. If complications occur they^ are to be 
treated on general principles. It should ever be 
remembered that the purulent discharge from 
these eyes is highly contagi(Mis, and that serious 
consequences are pretty sure to result if it is per- 
mitted to come in contact with any unaffected eye. 
Absorbent cotton is a good article to use in cleans- 
ing the infant's eyes, and the pieces employed 
should be at once destroyed after use, and not be 
placed where they can get into the hands of other 
children and thus spread the disease. 
[Specially Compiled for Popular Science News.] 
MONTHLY SUMMARY OF MEDICAL 
PROGRESS. 
BY MADKICE D. CLARKE, M. D. 
Pekoxide of Hydrogen.— Peroxide of hydro- 
gen is a drug which has been gradually and 
steadily gaining in favor, and which has yielded 
to each who has faithfully tried it results so con- 
stant and so satisfactory that he has learned to 
depend upon it. As ordinarily found in the shops, 
peroxide of hydrogen is a 3.2 per cent, solution, 
yielding fifteen times its bulk of oxygen. This 
solution is far more potent than is water charged 
with fifteen times its volume of oxygen, since in 
the peroxide preparations the gas is given off in 
its nascent state and is peculiarly powerful in its 
chemical afflnities. 
There is abundant evidence as to the value of 
the peroxide, from both the clinical and the exper- 
imental standpoint. The number of those who 
have reported excellent results from its use is 
very large, and to this must be added the testi- 
mony of the bacteriologists, who find in this drug 
a potent and almost immediate germiciile. It is 
devoid of septic properties, its worst effect being, 
when used in a too concentrated form, to cause 
some local pain and irritation. It is applicable in 
all cases where pus is present, and where the dis- 
charge is foul aud profuse its effect is admirable. 
In suppurating otitis media, in purulent conjunc- 
tivitis, the aurists and ophthalmogists have long 
prized it as ^ne of their most valuable medica- 
ments. In the sloughing inflammations following 
scarlet fever and diphtheria the laryngologists 
place great confidence in its powers. Surgeons, 
however, in whose work it might prove generally 
valuable, have been somewhat slow to recognize 
its virtues. But its use iu a great variety of 
sloughing and suppurating cases has given results 
better than those obtained from any other germi- 
cide, bichloride of mercury not excepted. Where 
the discharging area is represented by a surface 
of granulations the drug can be applied by means 
of an atomizer. This enables a small quantity to 
reach every portion of the infected surface. In 
the case of a suppurating fistula or cavity, the 
peroxide may be injected by means of a syringe. 
Immediately following its application to a puru- 
lent surface, an active effervescence goes on, and 
every particle of pus wliich it reaches is destroyed. 
Xot only this, but the microbes, the active agents 
of pus formation, are also devitalized, so that a 
large surface cau sometimes be rendered aseptic 
by one or two thorough applications. Even if this 
result is not reached, the discharge is greatly 
lessened, and it is by no means uncommon to see 
a case in which the pus had amounted to drams, 
so favorably affected that the dressings contain 
but a few drops of purulent matter. 
The strength in which the fifteen-volume solu- 
tion is used will vary with individual cases. It 
can be employed without harm in full strength. 
Wliere this is painful, one, two, or four parts of 
water may he added. — University Magazine. 
Hot Water for Sleeplessness.^ A most 
wi'etched lie-awake of thirty -five years, who 
thought himself happy if he could get twenty 
minutes' sleep in twentj'-four hours, said : I took 
hot water, a pint, comfortably hot, one good hour 
before each of my three meals, and one the last 
thing at niglit, naturally unmixed with anything 
else. The very first night I slept for three hours 
on end, turned around and slept again till morn- 
ing. I have faithfully and regularly continued 
the hot water, and have never had one bad night 
since. Pain gradually lessened and went, the 
shattered nerves became calm and strong, and 
instead of each night being one long misery spent 
in wearying for the morning, they are all too 
short for the sweet, refreshing sleep I now enjoy. 
— London Spectator. 
Ophthalmoscopic Evidences of Death. — 
According to Dr. W. R. Gowers, of England, as 
soon as the heart ceases to beat and respiration 
stops, the ditt'used redness of the optic nerve discs, 
caused by capillary circulation, disappears in a 
few minutes, and the nerves become white. As 
the heart's action slowly fails before death, the 
arteries diminish in size, and when it ceases, the 
diminution is suddenly increased, and they 
"quickly disappear from the disc, appearing to 
commence at its edge." In the retina they remain 
longer, but diminished in size. The veins persist 
longer than the arteries ; but, like them, may 
rapidly become invisible on the disc, " appearing 
to start from its edge." The blood in them soon 
breaks up into fragments, giving them a "beaded 
appearance.'' The veins in the retina remain visi- 
ble, while the " beaded appearance increases." In 
ten to thirty minutes the arteries are no longer 
visible in the retina. The color of the choroid 
remains normal for a few minutes and tlien under- 
goes various changes, according to the amount of 
pigment it contains. Soon the retina becomes 
opaque, when a red spot in the macula lutea may 
be seen, because free from opacification, just as is 
the case in embolism of the central artery. In the 
course of about six hours the media become so 
hazy that further observation is impossible. The 
reason of the rapid disappearance of the arteries 
is because their continued contraction, after 
death, presses the blood out of them. 
Amaurosis and Amblyopia. — These words 
practically mean the same thing — obscure vision, 
writes Dr. A. D. Williams in the St. Louis Medical 
and Surgical Journal. Custom, however, makes 
amaurosis apply to conditions of complete blind- 
ness where no visible causes can be discovered, 
while amblyopia designates partial blindness 
without any visible or discoverable causes. Some 
one has aptly defined amaurosis to be that condi- 
tion in which "the patient cannot see, and the 
doctor cannot tell why he cannot see."' 
The same definition applies with equal appro- 
priateness to amblyopia : " The patient cannot see 
well." 
At present amaurosis is only rarely used, for the 
reason that the direct cause of the blindness can 
nearly always be diagnosed. On the contrary, 
amblyopia is iu constant use, and is made to 
designate the obsure or imperfect vision in numer- 
ous conditions where no actual or visible disease 
can be discovered. I mention only a few of them : 
Whiskey, tobacco, quinine, traumatic, salicylic 
acid and its compounds, uramiic, glycosuric, 
hajmorrhagic, aud hysterical amblyopia. 
In some of these conditions visible lesions may 
