Domestic Encyclopædia (1802)/Fumigation
FUMIGATION, in medicine, denotes the artificial impregnation of the atmosphere, with the fames or smoke of any vegetable or aromatic substance.
Considerable injury is often produced by inhaling the subtle corrosive fumes of metallic and other processes; so that palsy in lead-mines, and pulmonary complaints in manufacturing towns, are but too frequent: hence we doubt whether medicated fumes deserve that encomium which has lately been bestowed on them, by various writers. In our opinion, there is no better and more effectual fumigator in Nature than pure air, frequently renewed by means of ventilators.
As, however, there are numerous advocates for factitious airs and fumigations, we have no hesitation to admit that they may sometimes be resorted to with advantage, for the purpose of purifying rooms that have been occupied by patients whose disorders were contagious. Hence the fumes of tobacco, and the effluvia of tar, have been especially praised. The late Dr. Lind advised cascarilla-bark to be burned, or the camphorated steam of vinegar to be diffused, as being eminently calculated to dispel infection.
With respect to the fumigation of stables, or other buildings, where cattle are infected with the distemper, it has been recommended to put an ounce of common salt in a varnished pipkin, upon which are to be poured two ounces of spirit of vitriol, diluted with one ounce of water. The vessel is then to be placed for an hour on a chafing-dish provided with live-coals, in order that its contents may be heated to a slight degree of ebullition. The whole being safely deposited in the middle of a stable, the vapours are permitted to rise, till the air of the building is saturated. Thus, the malignant miasmata in the air, are supposed to be neutralized, or corrected; but the process ought to be repeated twice in twenty-four hours, at equal periods, during the prevalence of the contagion.—No good, however, will result from this or any other fumigation, without the frequent admission, and change, of fresh air.