THE POISONOUS PLANTS OF BOMBAY. Til 



« 



and clinical questions. Other journals of a less popular character are 

 open to me for a discussion, which could hardly be expected to be of 

 any importance or use to the readers of this journal. I wish to direct 

 my remarks in the following pages to what I consider the kernel of 

 my observations under the head oi poisonous properties in the descrip- 

 tion of this plant. 



The chief point, then, that I wish to impress upon the readers of 

 this journal is that, recognizing, as I do fully, the emetic properties 

 of the root-bark, I have sufficient reasons, from personal experience, to 

 be able to say that, although the root-bark may, and does in my 

 experience, prove an efficient substitute for ipecacuanha as an emetic, 

 I cannot endorse the opinion of Mooideen Sheritf " that it is safe in 

 doses of even fifty grains, I would rather use ipecacuanha as an eme- 

 tic — certainly not ^/a?2^mm root instead. The officinal dose of ipeca- 

 cuanha powder as an emetic is 15 to 30 grains. Dr. A. B. Garrod* 

 distinctly says that " in large doses it has considerable power in lower- 

 ing the circulation." This veteran therapeutist includes the drug 

 amongst those that act as sedatives on the vessels and capillary system. 

 Dr. Lauder Brunton saysf that "ipecacuanha is one of the drugs 

 which, while it increases the secretion of the lungs and bronchi 

 generally, tends to lessen the hlood-pressure.'''' In the earlier portion of 

 his work (p. 219) he says, with regard to Emetin, which is the uncrys- 

 tallized active principle obtained from ipecacuanha, that, ^' when 

 injected either subcutaneously or into the veins, it produces death by 

 cardiac paralysis. It paralyses the vessels first and then the heart, so 

 that the blood-pressure sinks to zero, while each cardiac pulsation is still 

 powerful." Dr. Ringer J says " that in large doses it produces both 

 nausea and vomiting, and, like other emetics, some general toeakness 

 with sweating!'' On the authority of M. Chouppe and Dyce-Duckworth, 

 Dr. Ringer further says that " emetin acts through the terminations of 

 the pneumogastric nerve," and that it " without doubt enters the 

 blood." According to Dr. Ringer, ipecacuanha is a distinct depressant. 



Sir Robert Christison, writing so far back as 1845, considers that 

 emeta (which is the term he uses for emetin of the present day) " is a 



Materia Medica, p. 396, Srd Ed., 1868. 

 t Pharmacology, 1885, p. 867. 

 X Therapeuticfs, 1880, 8th Ed., pp. 406 to 419. 



