COMPARATIVE VALUE.—Ether is ex tensively used as an ansthetic in the United States. In other countries chlo roform is still preferred by the ma jority of surgeons, but ether is steadily gaining advocates, owing to its superi ority in practically every direction. It possesses the following advantages: Greater safety, less marked after-effects, greater rapidity of induction of andes thesia, equal muscular relaxation, and less shock.
The comparative safety of ether as an andesthetic is further demonstrated by statistics. Those of Foy, based upon 877,507 chloroform administrations, show a mortality of 204, or 1 in 4301, while those of Julliard based upon 314, 738 ether administrations show a mor tality of only 21, or 1 in 14,987.
Statistics of the German Surgical So ciety, collected from 5S reports received from Germany and 9 from other sources: The whole number of cases in which anesthetics were given is 51,546; of chloroform, 32,725; ether, 11.617; mixt
ure of chloroform and ether, 3506; Bill roth's mixture, 750; bromide of ethyl, 2769. In all there were 20 deaths,—a mortality of 1 in 25S7; but 6 other deaths have to be added to this list, hav ing been more or less due to an anes thetic. Chloroform caused 17 deaths in 32.725: i.e., 1 in 1924. Taking the figures of the past year (four in all) during which returns have been obtained by the society, there is an average of 1 death in 2645 administrations of chloroform; 1 death in 5014 of chloroform-and-ether mixture; 1 in 4S90 of Billroth's mixt ure (chloroform, ether, alcohol); 1 in 26,263 of ether. Gurlt (Deutsche med. Zeitung, May 31, '94).
Three hundred and fifty thousand cases reported in which ether was used, with but 25 deaths, and 134,000 chloro formizations, with 46 deaths. Garri: (Beitrag z. klin. Chir., B. 11, H. 1, '94).