Electrisation of the Membranes of the Brain
327
The following1 interesting account of the beneficial effect of electrifying the brain was published in the Gazette Hebdom., October 3, 1 829 :?
” Of the Effects of Cephalic Electrisation upon the Vessels of the Dura-Mater and of the Pia-Mater.?By Dr Cir. Letouiinian.
“c We have, then, undertaken to determine directly, what is the effect upon the vessels of the envelopes of the brain, of a moderate electrisation, practised with the continued current through the integuments and the cranial wall, nearly in the ordinary medical conditions. For this it was sufficient to make bare, in a mammifer, a portion more or less extensive of the cerebral membranes.’ Doctor Laborde assisted him in the experiment, and in a kitten a month old, in which the cranial wall was still very thin, and was quite easy to cut, a consider- able portion of cranium has been cut out on the left side. The dura-mater being so exposed, it was very easy to see with the naked eye, and still better with a magnifying glass, the arterial and venous branches which ramify upon the surface. We pro- ceeded then to the electrisation, making use of the small port- able pile for continuous current of MM. Onimus and Brown. This pile contains eighteen elements, and we took care, by the aid of a galvanometer introduced into the circuit, to assure ourselves that the passage of the current was effected regularly. During all the duration of the experiment, the positive pole was placed behind fhe right ascending ramus of the inferior maxilla, and the negative pole upon the anterior cranial region above the eyes.
” Ten or fifteen seconds after the closing of the circuit, the fine arterial branchings of the dura-mater became less and less visible, and, a little later, the venous branches themselves became pale. At each interruption of the current the anemia increased for an instant, then the vessels resumed, little by little, a little larger calibre.
” The experiment, repeated a number of times, gave always the same results, determined successively by Doctors Duval, Laborde, Condereau, and ourselves. The dura-mater of the riglit side having been denuded in its turn, the experiment was repeated, which on this side again gave the same results. We pursued the experiment, cutting out on the left side a portion, of the dura-mater. The pia-mater being thus exposed, and its vascular branches, arterial and venous, being very visible upon the gray ground of the cerebral substance, the same observa- tions were made upon it. There, also, we could obtain at will, contraction of the vessels.
” The experiments, which we have just related, added to facts cited in the commencement of this paper, put it beyond doubt that it is possible, even easy, to produce in man a temporary anemia of the brain, by means of suitable electrisation ; but the therapeutical bearing of this fact should not escape the physi- cian. For this temporary anemia can, without the least incon- venience, be renewed a great number of times daily, if one wishes; and our personal experience permits us to affirm that, with a little persistence, one may triumph so over various con- gestive states of the brain, manifesting themselves either by the simple depression of the intellectual faculties or by psychical disorders of varied nature.
” In support of the preceding, we shall cite the following fact, chosen among many others, and which appears to us typical. It concerns a case of cerebral congestion, or, rather, of a chronic congestive state of the brain, which has yielded to electrisation repeated persistently.
44 The patient, the Abbe C., aged 55 years, is a corpulent, full-blooded person, with a highly-coloured countenance. When he applied to us he was in despair, because he suffered several times a week from persistent vertigo, during the duration of which he could not take a step without support, and from which he was relieved only by absolute repose. M. C. belonged to a religious community whose principal object is teaching, but he was obliged to renounce, little by little, all work. It had come to pass, he said, that he could scarcely recite his breviary and say mass. After various treatment, there was made to him, at the end of five months, an application of fifteen leeches, with so little effect that the next day he had a severe cerebral congestion, with loss of consciousness and instantaneous fall. This serious accident occurred several times afterwards, and was ordinarily accompanied by violent vomiting.
41 To modify this inveterate organic state and restore a proper tonic contraction to vessels habitually dilated, a treatment of long duration was necessary. During five months we electrised the patient three times a week, placing the positive pole of a pile with continuous current at the level of the first cervical vertebra, the negative pole at the level of the superior ganglion of one of the cervical sympathetic nerves. The number of elements employed varied from fifteen to twenty, and we took care to interrupt the current every fifteen seconds; for experi- ence shows that vascular contraction is produced especially at the opening and closing of the current.
” Each seance affected an immediate amelioration, and longer and longer. Soon the patient was able to resume his occupa- tion, and to work, at first one hour, then two hours, then four and five hours per day. At the same time the attacks of vertigo became more and more rare and brief. At the end of fiye months, the patient ceased a treatment which was no longer necessary; and for several months the alleviation has con- tinued.
” This fact is so eloquent that it appears ito us useless to accompany it with comments, and it will surely suggest to practising physicians, therapeutic applications numerous and various.,”
The following jeu cVesprit appeared originally in an American paper. It forms a good accompaniment to the Catechism of Advanced Views, published in the second volume of the new series of the Journal of Psychological Medicine:? ” I believe in the chaotic Nebula, self-existent Evolver of Heaven and earth, and in the differentiation of its original homogeneous Mass, its first-begotten Product, which was self- formed into separate worlds; divided into land and water; self- organised into plants and animals ; reproduced in like species ; further developed into higher orders; and finally refined, rationalised, and perfected in Man. He descended from the Monkey, ascended to the Philosopher, and sitteth down in the rites and customs of Civilisation, under the laws of a developing Sociology. From thence -he shall come again, by the disinte- gration of the culminated Heterogeneousness, back to the original Homogeneousness of Chaos. I believe in the wholly impersonal Absolute, the wholly un-Catholic Church, the dis- union of the Saints, the survival of the Fittest, the Persistence of Force, the Dispersion of the Body, and in Death Everlasting.” Darwinism at the Institute of France.?At a recent meet- ing of the Academie des Sciences M. le Baron Larrey read an analysis of Dr Bateman’s (of Norwich) book on ” Darwinism Tested by Language,” the communication being received by that learned body with marked attention and much interest.
Baron Larrey pointed out that Dr Bateman had transferred the subject of evolution to the domain of psychology. He was con- vinced that hitherto naturalists had concentrated their attention too exclusively on the analogies between the body of man and that of animals, or, in other words, on the purely physical, anatomical, and material characters of man, neglecting the study of the intellectual and metaphysical attributes which establish an essential difference between man and the brute. Dr Bateman’s researches, which have been so warmly eulogised by a portion of the English press, and as severely criticised by the Darwinians, seem to have met with a most favourable re- ception amongst men of science in Paris. “We understand that a French translation of the entire work will shortly appear.
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