American Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacognosy

It is now generally used internally and externally in the treatment of
appendicitis, and it is a most efficacious remedy. It is given freely,
internally at regular intervals, and after its external application heat is
kept constantly applied. Indicated remedies for the fever and for the
prominent symptoms should not be overlooked.
It is of much value in the removal of biliary calculi. In these cases from
six to twelve ounces is the necessary quantity for administration,
repeated three or four times daily. The influence is often pronounced.
It is an excellent agent in dysentery, whether of infants or adults. It may
be given per orem, and a quantity subsequently injected into the rectum
after a bowel movement. If for an adult, two ounces, into which ten drops
of laudanum has been rubbed, is injected, often the distress is so relieved
that it need not be repeated.
The injection of sweet oil is essential in impaction of the feces, and
where there is great deficiency of intestinal secretion, or where scybala
form, or where there are ulcers or fissures and great pain is induced by
the presence of fecal matter in the rectum.
A feeble, newly born infant may be quickly bathed in warm sweet oil and
wrapped in cotton, and surrounded by heat and not dressed for several
days. The oil can be wiped off once daily with a soft linen cloth and fresh
warm oil applied. In healthy infants it is better to apply warm. oil freely,
wipe it off once and apply more. The child should then be wrapped in
warm wrappings and not dressed for twenty-four hours.
Olive oil is the best of lubricants, and the carbolized oil is used for
chafing and upon hands and instruments in surgery, and in vaginal
examinations, and in introducing bougies or catheters. If a stream of
warm oil be forced into the urethra in spasmodic stricture just in advance
of the catheter, the dilation may be made satisfactorily, and the catheter
may be introduced when that act was previously impossible.
Olive oil is exceedingly valuable in the treatment of sprained, bruised or
contused parts, applied warm on absorbent cotton and kept hot. It acts as
nutrition to the part, diffuses the heat and is markedly soothing in its
influence.
Olive oil is used to protect the mucous surfaces of the esophagus and
Ellingwood’s American Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacognosy - Page 309