TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS AD- 
DICTION TO OPIUM.-RE- 
COVERY.-RELAPSE. 
by j. b. mattison)^ d. 
Medical Director Brooklyn Home for Habitues. 
REPRINT FROM THE 
New England Medical Monthly 
For March, 1893. 
Danbury, Conn., 
THE DANBURY MEDICAL PRINTING COMPANY, 
1893. TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS AD- 
DICTION TO OPIUM.-RE- 
COVERY.-RELAPSE. 
BY J. B. MATTISON, M. D. 
Medical Director, Brooklyn Home for Habitues. 
MR. A., clergyman, age 49, while 
in the army, during 1862, was 
given opium for relief of diarrhoea, 
and-history repeating itself-became 
an habitue. Nine years later, he quit 
the drug, and remained free nine 
months. Physical causes compelled 
a re-using. He continued it fifteen 
years, taking 21 grs. of the gum, 
daily, in equal amount before meals. 
Four years ago, he fell into the 
clutches of an opium shylock, who 
robbed him of hard earned dollars 
and left him taking morphia-Vide. 
Expose by the writer "Opium Anti- 
dotes and their Vendors." 4 
to take opium by bowel, ended the 
good work so well begun. 
What are the teachings of this 
case ? 
i. That the habitual use of opium 
is less pernicious than morphine, and 
morphine by mouth less damaging 
than subdermic taking. 
2. That the reflex effects of quitting 
this form of opiate are less marked 
than after the hypodermic plan. 
3. That the final result emphasizes 
the paramount need of favoring condi- 
tions and proper care after acute cure. 
Vide-"The Post Active Treatment 
of Narcotic Habitues." 
4. That, this need supplied, pro- 
longed narcotic taking does not debar 
success. 
Brooklyn Avenue, Brooklyn.