Within the past few years, the subcutaneous injection of ether has taken an important position in therapeutics. It is necessary, therefore, to enter into this subject fully.

When ether is injected beneath the skin, more or less burning pain is felt at the point of insertion, and a puffy swelling is produced. In most subjects this swelling subsides in an hour or two, and no trace is left of the operation. In some instances, an induration, the size of a filbert, forms, and slowly disappears. Very rarely inflammation is set up about the site of the injection, and followed by suppuration, with more or less sloughing. If not too large an amount, suddenly and violently injected, is used, there will be no untoward results.

The effects of ether subcutaneously are the same in kind as, but more powerful in degree than, those produced by the stomachal administration. A local anaesthetic impression is made; in a few seconds, the action of the heart is powerfully increased, and soon the usual cerebral effects are manifest.

Ether was first employed subcutaneously by Dr. Comegys, of Cincinnati, in the treatment of sciatica. He injected from fifteen minims to a half-drachm, in the neighborhood of the affected nerve. This practice has been followed by others with success, and is now more or less widely used as a substitute for "the deep injection of chloroform." It is very desirable to have some exact observations which will determine the comparative value of these expedients.

The most important applications of ether, hypodermatically, are as a cardiac stimulant in the case of sudden and extreme depression of the heart, and as a general stimulant in adynamic states. In the depression caused by haemorrhage, whether pulmonary or post partum, the injection of ether may obviate the necessity for transfusion. This practice is strongly urged by Peter, Féréol, and Mlle. Ocoumkoff, who report cases in confirmation. Remarkable results have been effected by the subcutaneous injection of ether in adynamic pneumonia (typhoid pneumonia), as practiced by M. Barth. Thus, of fourteen cases of severe type treated by these injections, eleven were cured. The quantity injected was about fifteen to twenty minims two, three, or four times a day, according to the degree of adynamia. The effects which follow almost immediately are these: the respiration becomes more easy, the pulse takes on more strength and volume, the tongue moistens, and the countenance assumes a better appearance. In from two to three minutes after the injection has been practiced, the odor of ether is recognizable in the breath (Barth).

In the eruptive fevers, especially in variola, the injections of ether have been used with admirable results (Castel). It is in a high degree probable that the same treatment will prove very useful in low forms of septic and inflammatory diseases in general. There can scarcely be any doubt that we have in this method a most useful addition to our therapeutical resources.

In place of ether, hydrobromic ether has been utilized in the treatment by the subcutaneous method of various spasmodic diseases, as whooping-cough, chorea, asthma, and similar affections.