5851

℞ Spiritus terebinthinae..... q. s.

Dress and wash out all sinuses of the affected parts thoroughly with it three times a day. Keep the wound covered with an antiseptic compress, and at the same time correct the asthenic condition of the general system.

The therapeutical properties of spirits of turpentine, which make it perhaps the most reliable agent in the treatment of hospital gangrene, are the following:

1. Its permeability.

2. It is a ready solvent of the broken down adipose tissue of the wound.

3. It has local, alterative, stimulating and sedative effects.

4. Its antizymotic properties.

5. It is antiseptic and styptic.

6. It is non-escharotic in its effects. It causes no immediate or chemical eschar, as does bromine, nitric acid, and some other remedies, which are often the means, unhappily, of retaining the vitiated secretions of the wound. - From the Author's letter to the Surgeon General U. S. A., March 20, 1864.