Tag: morphine
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From poppy to morphine and heroin
JMS Pearce Hull, England Among the remedies which it has pleased almighty God to give to man to relieve his sufferings, none is so universal and so efficacious as opium. – Thomas Sydenham, 1680 The controversial pharmaceutical company Farbenfabriken Bayer AG* had an important role in the development of morphine, heroin, and aspirin,…
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Dr. Mikhail Bulgakov and morphine
Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Centers for Disease Control Public Health Image Library. Public domain. “During the years of war and revolution it was hard to find a hospital without morphine-addicted patients.”1 – Vladimir Gorovoy-Shaltan, physician specialist in addiction medicine Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov (1891–1940) was a Russian physician, novelist, and playwright. He earned his…
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Memories of a West Virginia coal camp
Calvin Kunin Columbus, Ohio, United States Coal town, Eastern Kentucky. Photo by Don Sniegowski. March 21, 2018. Via Flickr. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. This is a brief account of my experience as a physician at a coal mining camp in rural West Virginia. It is based on my memory of events that took place almost…
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Ella’s addiction: the story of a mother and morphine
Lisa Mulleneaux New York, New York, United States Ella Quinlan O’Neill in the early 1880s. Courtesy of Yale University Library Doctors today are relearning lessons from a century ago when overprescription of opioids created an epidemic of addicts, most of whom were upper-class or middle-class women. Eugene O’Neill’s mother, Mary “Ella” Quinlan O’Neill, was…
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Poppy power
John Graham-Pole Gainesville, Florida, United States Dr. Graham-Pole with cancer patient, Bridget. At the time of the photo, Bridget had life-threatening cancer requiring opioids, and is now a successful artist. Author photo. The poppy’s juice . . .brings the sleep to dear Mama — Sara Coleridge, Pretty Lessons in Verse for Good Children In…
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On being a spousal caregiver
William Black Knoxville, Tennessee, United States When I was 55 years old, and had been in the private practice of Internal Medicine and Nephrology for 22 years, my wife Barbara was diagnosed with breast cancer. At the time of her diagnosis she already had widespread bony metastases. Five weeks later, I came home one…
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Illuminating addiction: morphinomania in fin-de-siècle visual culture
Natalia Vieyra Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States Paul-Albert Besnard, Morphinomanes ou Le Plumet, 1887 Etching and drypoint, plate: 9 5/16 x 14 inches (23.75 x 35.6 cm) Sheet: 12 5/8 x 17 5/8 inches (32.1 x 44.8 cm) Philadelphia Museum of Art Purchased with the SmithKline Beckman Corporation Fund, 1980 The etchings of Paul-Albert…