IMPORTANT POISONS AND THEIR TREATMENT 



By R. v. JAKSCH, Prague 



It is a difficult undertaking to confine within the limits of an article all 

 the data of importance in the study of the poisons with which the practising 

 physician is likely to come into contact. 



In modern clinical medicine, the conception of poisoning must be very 

 widely extended. The amount of material to be considered is enormous, be- 

 cause every pathogenic agent which finds entrance into the human organism, 

 including also every contagium vivum, may produce toxic action. This great 

 group of poisons, the endogenous toxicoses, we shall not here consider, but 

 shall content ourselves with the discussion of the exogenous toxicoses which 

 are most important to the physician. 



In the definition of the word poison, we are at once confronted with diffi- 

 culties which need not be further dwelt upon. Our object is to consider a 

 number of symptoms; and the treatment of a series of diseases all of which 

 are due to the introduction within the body of certain well-known chemical 

 agents from without. These agents inchide the acids, the alkalies, the metal- 

 loids, the metallic salts, gases, bodies that belong to organic chemistry, such 

 as the fat derivatives, bodies of the aromatic group, the camphors and balsams, 

 the alkaloids, the glucosides, bitter and indifl;erent bodies, the toxalbumins 

 and, finally, vegetable and animal poisons, the composition of which is only 

 partially known to us. 



From this almost endless series it is apparent that we cannot describe all 

 of the pathologic pictures produced by these poisons, but it will be our object 

 to take, as an example, an important representative of each of the previously 

 mentioned groups, and describe its effects. 



We will first direct our attention to the acids. The pathologic processes 

 produced by these poisons may very properly be designated as acidosis. The 

 differences between these acids and in their composition, if we include the 

 organic and inorganic varieties, are parallel with the difference in the clinical 

 picture which develops after their introduction into the human organism. 

 As the type of acidosis, I shall consider inorganic acid, sulphuric acid, and 

 shall discuss the important symptoms of this poison as acidosis. I may re- 

 mark that I choose this particular acid for the reason that this acid toxicosis 

 is observed with relative frequency by the physician. 



There can be no doubt that by the introduction of large amounts of acids, 

 nervous symptoms may be produced; but symptoms of this kind are rarely 

 observed at the bedside, as the local symptoms produced by the acid toxicosis 



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