Action of Medicines in the System

For details, see Frederick William Headland, The Action of Medicines in the System, Third Edition (Philadelphia Lindsay and Blakiston, 1859), pp. 422, 431-433. 

Before examining Civil War pharmacy directly, it is essential to understand the therapeutic contexts in which that care was provided. This can be done by carefully reviewing the standard texts of the period. There are several authoritative guides The Pharmacopoeia of the United States of America, Fourth Decennial Edition (Philadelphia J. B. Lippincott, 1863) George B. Wood and Franklin Bache, The Dispensatory of the United States of America, Eleventh Edition (Philadelphia J. B. Lippincott, 1858) George B. Wood, A Treatise on the Practice of Medicine, 2 volumes. Fifth Edition (Philadelphia J. B. Lippincott, 1858) William Headland, The Action of Medicines in the System, Third Edition (Philadelphia Lindsay and Blakis-ton, 1859) and Alfred Stille, Therapeutics and Materia Medica, 2 volumes. Second Edition (Philadelphia Blanchard and Lea, 1864). Once the theory and practice of medicine during the war are understood, pharmacy begins to take on some familiar forms as the material expression of nineteenth-century medical rationalism. 

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