TRANSFUSION

TRANSFUSION, the act of pouring a liquor out of one vessel into another.

TRANSFUSION of Blood, an operation by which it was some time ago imagined that the age of animals would be renewed, and immortality, or the next thing to it, conferred on those who had undergone it. The methods of performing it were as follow.

1. Take up the carotid artery of the dog, or other animal, whose blood is to be expended; separate it from the nerve of the eighth pair, and lay it bare for above an inch. Then make a strong ligature, not to be untied again, on the upper part of the artery; but

Transfusion an inch below, viz. towards the heart, make another ligature with a running knot, which may be loosened or fastened as occasion requires. Having made these two knots, draw two threads under the artery, between the two ligatures; then open the artery, and put in a quill, or rather a crooked pipe of silver or brass, so slender that one end may enter a quill, and having at the other end, which is to go into the artery, a small knob. This being done, make fast the artery to the pipe by means of the two threads abovementioned, stopping the end of the quill with a peg till there be occasion for opening it. Perform a similar operation on the jugular vein of another dog; and having made a communication between the two animals, let another vein be opened in the animal into which the blood is to be transfused, and let the blood run freely out from it. The blood from the animal which is to be killed will run into the jugular vein, and supply the place of that which runs out from him; and thus the one dog will be bled to death, while the other suffers nothing, but will run about briskly as soon as he is unloosed and the wounds tied up.

2. In making this experiment, the following circumstances are to be attended to. 1. That the animals be fastened at such convenient distance from one another that the vein or artery be not stretched. 2. If the pulse fails beyond the quill in the jugular vein, the passage will be stopped up by coagulated blood, in which case the quill must be taken out and cleaned.

3. It must also be considered, that after a few minutes the blood of the emittent animal will mix with the other, and run out at the orifice; therefore, in order to be assured that the recipient animal has none of his own blood in him, two or three or more animals may be prepared, and all of them bled into one.

4. The most probable use of this experiment may be, that from several found animals a diseased one may be supplied with an entire new mass of blood, and that without destroying or hurting in the least the animals which give it; as a healthy animal could at any time spare a pretty large quantity of blood without any apparent detriment.

5. In this manner a mastiff dog was bled into a curr; and the little dog emitted, at least, double the quantity of blood which he could be supposed to possess naturally, when the mastiff died. The curr being untied, ran away and shaked himself as if he had been thrown into water.

6. A communication was made between the jugular vein of a calf and a sheep; the former being designed for the emittent, and the latter for the recipient animal. The sheep lost 45 ounces, avoirdupois weight, of blood, before any of the calf's blood was received; and at this time it was judged that the sheep must have been very faint. The calf's blood was then suffered to run into a porringer for 40 seconds, in which time the animal had bled 10 ounces. This was done with a view to ascertain the quantity which should be received by the sheep; but as it could not be supposed that the blood would run so fast into the sheep's vein as into the porringer, the calf was allowed to bleed for five minutes; when it was supposed that the sheep had received as much blood as she had lost. Being then untied, she seemed to have as much strength as before the operation.

7. A sheep, having bled 45 ounces, was supplied Transfusion with as much or more from a calf; after which she appeared not at all to be hurt by the experiment, but continued lusty and strong.

8. A young land-spaniel was bled to 14 or 16 ounces, which was at the same time supplied by the blood of an old mongrel curr all over-run with the mange; but the spaniel was not in the least hurt by the exchange, though the curr was cured of his mange by the evacuation.

9. The blood of a young dog being transfused into the veins of an old one almost blind with age, the latter began to leap and frisk, though he could hardly stir before. What became of him afterwards is not mentioned.

10. The blood of three calves was transfused into three dogs; after which all the dogs eat as well as before; and one from whom so much blood had been drawn the day before that he could scarcely stir, having been supplied the next morning with the blood of a calf, instantly recovered his strength, and showed a surprising vigour.

11. A bitch, having lost 30 ounces of blood, and being supplied with an equal quantity from some other animal, not only survived that experiment, but also the loss of her spleen, which was afterwards cut out, without tying up the vessels.

12. The blood of one lamb was entirely transfused into another; after which the lamb that had received the blood seemed to be well, and grew like other lambs; but in eight months after the operation it died; whether from the consequences of the transfusion or not, cannot be determined.

13. The blood of a lamb was transfused into the veins of a spaniel 13 years old, who for three years had been so deaf that he was insensible to the loudest noise. He walked very little, and was so feeble, that being unable to lift up his feet, he only trailed his body forward. After the operation he remained for an hour upon the table, then he leaped down, and went to seek his master who was in another room. Two days after he went abroad, and ran up and down the street with other dogs, without trailing his body as he had done formerly. He also began to recover his hearing, and in a month's time had recovered it so far that he always returned at the voice of his master.

14. The blood of four wedders was transfused into a horse 26 years old, who by that means was much invigorated, and had his appetite greatly increased.

15. The experiment of transfusing blood into an human vein was performed by Dr Richard Lower and Sir Edmund King, upon one Mr. Arthur Coga, on the 23d of November 1667. The manner of doing it is related in the following words. "Having prepared the carotid artery in a young sheep, we made an incision ^{Lowtherp's Phil. Transf. abridged, vol. III. p.} in the vein, observing the method above-mentioned²³¹ without any alteration but in the shape of one of our pipes, which was found more convenient for our purpose. And having opened the vein in the man's arm with as much ease as in common venesection, we let thence run out six or seven ounces of blood. Then we planted our silver pipe into the said incision, and inserted quills between the two pipes already advanced in the two subjects, to convey the arterial blood from the sheep into the vein of the man. The blood ran freely

Transfusion freely into the vein for the space of two minutes at least; so that we could feel a pulse in the said vein just beyond the end of the silver pipe. The patient said he did not feel the blood hot, (as had been reported of a man upon whom the like transfusion had been practiced in France); which may very well be imputed to the length of the pipes, through which the blood passed, losing thereby so much of the heat as to come into a temper very agreeable to the venous blood. That the blood did run all the time of those two minutes we conclude from hence. First, Because we felt a pulse during that time. Secondly, Because when, upon the man's saying he thought he had enough, we drew the pipe out of the vein, the sheep's blood ran through it in a full stream; which it would not have done if there had been any stop before, in the space of those two minutes, the blood being so very apt to coagulate in the pipes upon the least stop, especially as the pipes were as long as three quills. From the quantity of blood which ran through the pipe into a porringer, we judged that about nine or ten ounces were received into the man's veins. The man, after the operation, as well as in it, found himself very well."

These are very favourable testimonies for this practice. However, according to Heister, it could scarce be ventured upon even in the most desperate cases: "For (says he) almost all the patients who have been this way treated, have degenerated into a stupidity, foolishness, or a raving or melancholy madness; or else have been taken off with sudden death, either in or not long after the operations. These lamentable and fatal consequences have brought the art of injections and transfusion into neglect at present: so that being suspected and condemned by proper judges at Paris, where they most flourished, we are told they were in a little time prohibited by a public edict of that parliament."—Yet, a little after, the same author adds, "But whether or no this method of injecting proper medicines into the blood may succeed, especially in desperate apoplexies, anginas, hydrophobia, &c. and whether it may not be often useful to discharge the morbid blood, and transfuse such as is found, or warm milk or broth in its stead, ought, in my opinion, to be determined by future and repeated experiment. Burmannus, in his Surgery, (Part III. cap. 31.) tells us, that he has not only performed the operation with success on others, but very happily on himself, being by this means cured not only of a troublesome itch, but also of a stubborn fever."

On the whole, it seems yet to be a matter of doubt whether the infusion of certain liquors, or the transfusion of blood into the veins, ought to be accounted a poisonous operation or a medicinal one; but if ever the transfusion of blood is meddled with, common sense seems to indicate that it is the blood of a human creature which ought to be received by one of the same species, and not that of a beast.