Page 85 - My FlipBook

REMEDIAL AGENTS..
§3
of turpentine, ginger, cardamom, calamus, gaultheria, peppermint,
origanum, etc., etc.
SEDATIVES.
S^atives are medicinal substances employed to diminish the
frequency of the action of the circulation, their therapeutic
influence being due, it is thought, to a stimulant character.
They reduce vascular excitement, and while relieving irritability
and irregularity of the heart's action, their first effect is to restore
its tone and force when it is in a morbidly depressed condition.
Substances known as refrigerants^ which possess the power of
diminishing febrile heat, allaying thirst, restoring the secretions,
and which comprise almost all of the neutral alkaline salts, are
also included with sedatives. Among the class known as seda-
tives are digitalis, American hellebore (veratrum viride), white
hellebore (veratrum album), yellow jasmine (gelsemium), tartar
emetic, nitrate of potassium, etc., etc. Among the class known
as refrigerants are borate of soda, citrate of potassium, acetate of
ammonia, spirit nitrous ether, and vegetable acids.
SPINANTS.
Spinants or spastics are medicinal substances employed to
excite muscular contraction. Vegetable spinants containing the
alkaloids strychnia and brucia, and employed therapeutically in
cases of torpid and paralytic conditions of the muscular system,
are the most important of this class ; also ergot, which is em-
ployed to excite muscular contraction of the uterus. Among the
class of spinants are such agents as nux vomica, and its alkaloid
strychnine, ignatia, cotton-root bark, ergot.
EMETICS.
Emetics are medicinal substances which excite vomiting, their
action being independent of any effect arising from the quantity
of the agent introduced into the stomach.
While the action of an emetic is local as regards the stomach,
it extends to almost every organ of the body, and in order that a
substance of this kind shall produce its effect upon the stomach,
it must first make an impression upon the cerebro-spinal axis.
Within fifteen or twenty minutes after an emetic is administered