Page:Alcohol, a Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine.djvu/47

During all these years it has been given only seventeen times, then almost entirely in surgical cases, and in nearly all of these a fatal result proved it to be useless. The patients who are restored to health leave without having had aroused or implanted in them a desire for alcoholic liquors, neither have they been taught to regard them as valuable aids to the recovery of health and strength. On the contrary, there have been many who have come in, suffering from this delusion, who have had it thoroughly dispelled, both by their own experience and the experience of their fellow patients.

Sir B. W. Richardson took charge of this hospital from 1892 until his death in 1897. In his report in 1893 he said:—

"I remember quite well when according to custom, I should have prescribed alcohol in all those cases that were not actually inflammatory (speaking of diseases of the alimentary system); but I never remember having seen such quick and sound recoveries as those which have followed the non-alcoholic method."

The following selection showing points of practice in this hospital is taken from the same report:

"For medicinal purposes, we are as free as possible from all complexity. We use glycerine for making what may be called our tinctures, and in my clinique I am introducing a series of 'waters'—aqua ferri, aqua chloroformi, aqua opii, aqua quinas, and so on—to form the menstruums of other active drugs when they are called for. I also follow the plan of having the medicines administered with a free quantity of water, and with as accurate a dosage as can be obtained, for I agree with Mr.