236 
G. ARCHIE STOCKWELL. 
tempting to keep up the pressure (so that for some seconds 
there may be a deceptive condition in which both pulse and 
respiration are present) yet a fatal termination is imminent. 
That this death from vaso-motor paralysis does sometimes oc¬ 
cur in man, is shown by the very rapid running pulse men¬ 
tioned in some cases that are on record, as preceding the fatal 
termination. Then it is seen that the work of the Commission 
gives no greater confidence in chloroform than was had be¬ 
fore ; and it scarcely needed the name of the Nizam of Hy¬ 
derabad to impress facts that have been known to practical 
anaesthetists for a quarter of a century. 
There are also certain other pathological features con¬ 
nected with the administration of chloroform to dogs, and 
possibly also to man. Ungar discovered that animals, espec¬ 
ially canines, chloroformed for several hours at a time and 
upon successive days, showed upon autopsy, indubitable 
evidence of fatally degeneration of (i), the heart and liver, (2), 
kidneys and muscular structure, and (3), gastric and mucous 
membranes generally.* 
Strassman, as the result of independent~experiments, cor¬ 
roborates Ungar, and sums up his researches as follows: 
1. After chloroformization, in dogs, there can be demon¬ 
strated a fatty metamorphosis of the liver; the heart may par¬ 
take of the same changes as a secondarv result—other organs 
are seldom affected. The changes consist of true fatty degen¬ 
eration and not of fatty infiltrations. 
2. Subsequently to the usual chloroform narcosis, and 
when recovery therefrom has apparently taken place, a fatal 
result is occasionally observed to occur. 
3. Inasmuch as in the fatal cases the heart changes were 
found to be particularly well marked, these latter may reason¬ 
ably be assumed to have been the cause of death. 
4. In non-fatal cases the evidence of degeneration changes 
are not found after several weeks. 
5. These changes are particularly prone to occur in those 
in whom debilitating influences, such as hunger, loss of blood, 
etc., can reasonably account for the susceptibility to the undue 
action of the anaesthetic. In young and vigorous animals, a 
greater power of resistance counteracts a tendency to these 
changes. 
* Virchow's Archives , B. D. 115. 
