TREATMENT OF MAMMITTS. 707 



should be cleared out as soon as possible. For this purpose saline 

 purgatives with diuretics are usually prescribed, but preference 

 should be given to those agents (pilocarpine, eserine, etc.), which, 

 administered subcutaneously, act quickly on the bowels. 

 Tympanites may be prevented by care in dieting, offering laxative 

 and easily digested food ; and in cases of relapse stimulants and nerve 

 tonics must be prescribed. Whether or not the inflammatory process 

 in the udder can be abated by medicines administered by the mouth 

 is uncertain, though some practitioners assert that improvement 

 generally follows a course of potassium iodide, or the orange sulphide 

 of antimony, both of which, in healthy animals, are partly excreted 

 in the milk. 



Local treatment includes massage, various applications to the 

 surface of the udder, and intra-mammary injections. Ointments 

 of camphor, opium, hemlock, or belladonna are considered to be of 

 real service in relieving pain in the early stage of the disease, and 

 repeated disinfection of the udder is said to check extension of the 

 infective process. Cold affusions, hot compresses, and poultices 

 of spent hops have been strongly recommended. Bang suggests 

 linseed or oatmeal poultices, and the application of linen or 

 woollen cloths wrung out of hot water and kept warm by covering 

 with Mackintosh. Fomentation with diluted alkali or soap and 

 water have often been advised. Once tension and pain diminish, 

 the parts may be smeared with flour paste and covered with wadding. 

 Vogel uses a mixture of two tablepoonsful of water, four of starch, 

 twenty of glycerine, and one of turpentine. When warm the mass 

 forms a paste, which is applied thickly and left on for fourteen days. 

 From time to time it may be removed to allow of massage, which 

 is of considerable assistance in this disease. Infriction with un- 

 guentum hydrargyri is useful. Johne employed a mixture of equal 

 parts of blue ointment, potash, soap and lard. Franck used an 

 ointment of ol. hyoscyam. 8, liquor ammon. caust. 2, camphor 1. 

 Slinging the udder, and warm fomentations frequently repeated, 

 relieve tension, tenderness and pain ; and massage, or infriction 

 with camphorated oil, mild fats, or weak ammonia liniment promotes 

 the circulation in the inflamed gland. For a few days, in most cases, 

 the teats should be drawn every hour to remove exudates, milk clots, 

 etc., from the galactophorous sinuses ; and the interior of the gland, 

 especially in parenchymatous mammitis, should be irrigated, after 

 drawing the teat, with antiseptic fluid introduced through a milk 

 catheter. For this purpose solution of boric acid (5 per cent.), 

 hydrogen peroxide (3 per cent.), carbolic acid (I per cent.), or physio- 



