ANTHELMINTICS:
Remedies which expel worms[[234]] from the intestinal canal.
It has been already stated, (page 90) that certain bodies have the power of increasing the peristaltic motions of the intestinal canal, by operating as mechanical stimulants upon its fibres; in this manner the filings of tin and iron, or the irritating down which covers the pods of the Dolichos Pruriens, are supposed to act in dislodging and evacuating the worms from the intestines. But there is a variety of remedies employed as vermifuges, which must owe their effects to a very different mode of operation; Bitters for instance appear to prove an absolute poison[[235]] to these animals, while they, at the same time, give an increased tone to the organs of digestion; from whose debility the generation of worms would seem to arise. Other remedies, again, obviously depend upon their simple cathartic property, for the powers which they possess in the evacuation of worms. See Terebinthinæ Oleum—Cambogia.
In the cure of Ascarides the local application of the remedy becomes necessary, in the form of glyster, and which acts both mechanically in washing out the gut, and medicinally in proving obnoxious to the animals. According to the experience of some of our best practitioners, a strong decoction of the Semina Santonici proves most efficacious upon these occasions.
DEMULCENTS:
Medicines which are capable of shielding sensible surfaces from the action of acrid matter, by involving it in a mild and viscid medium.
It cannot be denied that where these remedies admit of direct application, considerable benefit may arise; in the progress of a catarrh, we have all experienced the relief that may be occasioned by lubricating the fauces with demulcents, which, by soothing the top of the trachea, quiets, by a kind of contiguous sympathy, the whole pulmonary structure; in certain states of intestinal irritation, the same remedies have furnished considerable benefit, and in ophthalmia, relief has been obtained by the application of a demulcent to the inflamed conjunctiva, by which it is defended from the irritation of the tears; see also Formula 61; but in parts beyond the reach of the first passages, and to which no fluid can arrive but through the medium of the secretions, it is very difficult to explain the principle upon which their beneficial operation can depend; and it seems indeed highly probable that they act in such cases as simple diluents, for the process of digestion must necessarily deprive them of their characteristic viscidity. The administration of demulcent drinks in gonorrhæa is probably of no farther service in assuaging the ardor urinæ, than an equivalent quantity of pure water; although Dr. Murray observes, “it is sufficiently certain, that many substances, which undergo the process of digestion, are afterwards separated in their entire state from the blood, by particular secreting organs; and there is, continues he, no gland which has this power more particularly than the kidneys; substances received into the stomach and digested, afterwards passing off in the urine with all their peculiar properties.” This is undoubtedly very true, but mucilaginous substances rarely or never pass off in this manner; if they evade the assimilative functions, they pass through the alimentary canal, and are thus eliminated. I can state, as the result of experiment, that the urine undergoes no change except in the relative proportion of its water, by the copious and repeated administration of mild mucilages. Dr. Saunders has very justly remarked that the long list of Ptisans, Decoctions, &c. usually prescribed upon these occasions, generally owe their virtues to the watery diluent itself.
The pharmaceutical applications of this class of medicines constitute, perhaps, not the least part of their value, by which we are enabled to introduce acrid substances into the stomach with safety and effect; but such services will more properly fall under our notice in a future part of the work.
DILUENTS:
Watery liquors, which increase the fluidity of the blood, and render several of the secreted and excreted fluids less viscid.