Aperient Medicines - Victorian Health and Medicine

APERIENT MEDICINES are those which have a purgative quality, and facilitate evacuations by removing obstructions. Remedies possessing this property in a milder or more intense degree should be administered according to the requirements of the case. When, for instance, a slight interruption in Nature's laws occurs, it would be injudicious to produce excessive evacuation by purging; whilst, on the other hand, when an obstinate obstruction offers itself, it would only enfeeble the constitution and encourage the continuance of the derangement, to apply to it such means as were inefficacious.

In the majority of cases aperient medicines may be taken without the intervention of medical advice; and when they are needed, either from some accidental circumstance, or from some peculiarity in a person's habit, which has become part of his nature, experience will soon teach him what is the kind of medicine, the strength of the dose, and the frequency of administration required.

In connection with this subject it should be remembered that when aperient medicines are being taken, their operation should be assisted by a suitable diet and regimen. If, for instance, a person having recourse to an aperient eats the same food and drinks the same liquids that he does on ordinary occasions, he is obviously wrong in so doing, because, under such circumstances, the operation of the medicine is impeded by the passage of the food through the body, and its demand upon the digestive organs. If, therefore, a person wishes for positive benefit and relief from aperient medicines, his diet for one, two, or three days, as the occasion suggests, should be of a light nature, and chiefly confined to what are called slops. For breakfast he should take a little dry toast, and a large-cup of tea; for dinner a basin of mutton, broth or beef tea; and for supper gruel or arrowroot. By adopting this course, the medicine will work off freely and thoroughly, and fresh energy and renewed appetite will be the reward for this temporary discipline.

At the same time, persons should be cautious not to take aperient medicines too frequently, as their repetition induces a state of the system sometimes constipated and sometimes relaxed, and which in the end becomes confirmed and habitual. There are, indeed, persons who have a morbid propensity for flying to these remedies to cure some trivial ailment, which a little judicious management of diet and regimen would relieve, without the aid of medicine at all.

The two most popular aperients that are used are " brimstone and treacle" for children, and "blue pill and black draught" for adults; both of these remedies are excellent and efficacious. To meet the several requirements for aperient medicines, however, we append here a few recipes, which may be fully relied on for performing the offices indicated.

Mild Aperient Pill for Adults. - Powdered rhubarb, half a drachm; powdered ipecacuanha, six grains; powdered Castile soap, fifteen grains; to be mixed with water, and made into twelve pills. Two to be taken every other night.

Strong Aperient Pill for Adults. - Compound extract of colocynth, half a drachm; powdered scammony, fifteen grains; powdered gamboge, fifteen grains; calomel, fifteen, grains; to be mixed with water and divided into twenty pills. Two for a dose as occasion requires.

Purgative Pill for Adults. - Powdered aloes, half a drachm; powdered Castile soap, half a drachm; made into pills. Two to be taken. as required.

Aperient Draught for Youth (from 10 to 12 Years of Age). - Senna leaves, four drachms; sliced ginger, half a drachm; tartrate of soda, half an ounce; extract of liquorice, one drachm; boiling water, six ounces. After these have stood for three hours, strain the liquor off and add tincture of cardamoms, half an ounce. Take two tea-ipoonsful every morning.

Mild Aperient Powder for Children (from 5 to 6 Years of Age). - Mercury with chalk, twelve grains; rhubarb powder, twenty-four grains; divided into six powders, one to be taken at night.

For Children from 3 to 5 Years of Age. - Mercury with chalk, six grains; rhubarb powder, twelve grains. To be divided and taken as above.

For Children from 1 to 3 Years of Age .- Mercury with chalk, five grains; rhubarb powder, ten grains. To be divided and taken as above.

To Infants 'under I Year of Age. - Mercury with chalk, three grains; rhubarb powder, six grains. To be divided and taken as above.

See also ALOES, CALOMEL, CASTILE SOAP, CASTOR OIL, COLCHICUM, COLOCYNTH, CROTON OIL, EPSOM SALTS, JALAP, RHUBARB, SENNA, &c.

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