8o OPERATIVE TECHNIQUE. 



Combined with starch or French chalk chinosol forms an efficient dry 

 dressing. 



Nitrate of silver of a strength of i to 2 percent., or of i per 1000, is 

 used with success for disinfecting certain inflamed mucous membranes. 



Boric acid is httle used in solution, but as a dry powder is widel}- 

 employed for dressing wounds after operation. Its irritant properties 

 are slight, and being non-volatile its action is long continued. A 

 saturated solution is of great value for operations on the eye, and 

 for disinfecting the mucous membranes of the buccal and nasal cavities, 

 the rectum, vagina, and bladder. 



Naphthol of a strength of i in 1000 is a feeble antiseptic. Naphthalin 

 has the same properties as naphthol, exercises a stimulating action on 

 the tissues, and promotes granulation of wounds. Camphorated naphthol 

 is a yellowish-brown, s\-rup3' liquid, produced b}' triturating one part of 

 naphthol with two parts of camphor. Camphorated salol is an opales- 

 cent liquid, produced by warming together equal parts salol and powdered 

 camphor. Camphorated thymol is an almost limpid fluid, produced by 

 triturating one part of thymol with two parts of camphor. These three 

 products are used in treating suppurating wounds. 



Sterilised salt solution consists of boiled water containing six to 

 seven grammes of chloride of sodium per litre, and is very useful in 

 washing out the abdominal cavity during or after operation. 



The number of antiseptics increases every day, but the more recent 

 have no marked superiority over those mentioned. Carbolic acid, 

 sublimate, chloride of zinc, and iodoform still maintain their position. 



Antisepsis and Asepsis in Practice. 



We shall now consider what antiseptics are best suited for dis- 

 infecting the hands of the surgeon and his assistants, the instruments, 

 dressings, and field of operation, and how they^can best be employed. 



Disinfection of the Hands, — Fiirbringer's experiments have 

 shown how difficult it is to render the hands aseptic. The matter is, 

 however, of the highest importance, as the operator's hands are not 

 infrequently the means of infecting operation wounds, and the surgeon 

 who desires to avoid after-complications will take especial care in this 

 respect. The spaces beneath the nails, the folds of skin at their base, 

 the folds of the skin itself, and the orifices of skin-glands are all refuges 

 for microbes, to destroy which demands the most minute precaution. 

 In some cases it is impossible to render the hands completely aseptic. 

 Kiimmel and others have shown that after soiling with pus or with 

 putrid or septic liquids from infected wounds or dead bodies, it is 



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