Introduction - Uppsala Monitoring Centre

Lion-Street, Clerkenwell: and sold by all booksellers. MDCCLXXXVII.
‘That languor, inability to perform wonted 149 exercise, loss of appetite,
paleness of the countenance and flabbiness of the skin, laxity,
paleness and sponginess of the gums, vertigo, profuse sweats on
slight exertions, nausea, a quick weak and small pulse, fever,
swelling of the lips, pains in the articulations, extreme debility and
foetid breath.’ (Maywood, 1787).
Mercury: ‘Surely a worse malady cannot seize the vision than
large quantities of motion bring on through the whole intestinal canal,
which, from a pthisis or ulcerated state becomes incapable of
bearing the lightest food without occasioning diarrhoea in which
much ichod 150 is commonly discharged, and the patient doesn’t
constantly suffer from tormenting gripes, or if he escapes this
violence, is frequently experiences a pain about the bones in many
parts of the body that make his life miserable.’
1788 The sixth edition of the London Pharmacopoeia (1788) paid special
attention to the use of chemistry in pharmacy, some 400 years after
Paracelsus first advocated it. Significantly, this edition was the first
authorized English-language edition. The 10 th and last London
Pharmacopoeia appeared in 1851.
‘An account of some experiments with opium in cure of the venereal
disease’ extracted from the correspondence of the military hospitals
of France and communicated to Dr Simmon by Dr JF Croste, First
physician to the French army. He treated 30 patients; after giving a
purgative he gave one grain of pure opium and increased the dose
the next day to two grains and then increased the dose by one grain
per day thereafter. This gave the following side effects: sweating,
increased urine, itching skin eruption, vomiting, increased stools,
pulse quickened, occasional giddiness, hiccoughs, increase in
internal heat, a kind of intoxication, disagreeable dreams and colicky
pains. Of the 30 patients he rated 18 as cured, 7 as doubtful cures, 4
as not cured and one died from TB (Coste, 1788).
‘Practical observations on venereal complaints’ by Franz Swediauer,
Edinburgh, 1788. Adverse events associated with mercury were:
‘salivation, disagreeable smell, painful mouth ulcers, vertigo,
trembling of the extremities, chronic violent pains in the articulations,
149 Wonted = customary
150 Ichod = ichor = a watery foetid discharge from a wound