The Special Chloroform Committee of the British Medical Association

The Special Chloroform Committee of the British Medical Association (sometimes referred to as the "Third Chloroform Committee" ^[1]) was established in 1901 following the annual meeting of the British Medical Association and it produced its last final report 1910.

The committee was instigated to investigate chloroform which was a subject of great interest to the profession and the public at the time.^[2]

The committee was started with a budget of £100^[3] and the committee was chaired by Dr. A. D. Waller, F.R.S.,^[4] and consisted of Dr. Barr, Dr. Dudley Buxton, Sit Victor Horsley, Dr. Sherrington and Dr Walker (and later Mr. A. Vernon Hardcourt and Professor Dunstan) "to investigate methods of quantitatively determining the presence of chloroform in the air and the living body".^[3]

Final report

In their final report the committee stated that Chloroform doses above 2% were unsafe as cardiac arrest occurred under inhibition of the vagus nerve.^[1]^[5] They also deemed these inhalers suitable for giving accurate measures of chloroform^[5]:

Snow's Inhaler
Charrière's Inhaler
Duroy's Anaesthesiometer
Junker's Inhaler (modified by Krohne and others)
Clover's Chloroform Inhaler
Paul Bert's Apparatus
Dubois's Machine
Harcourt's Regulator
Roth-Dräger
Levy's Inhaler
Waller's Wick Inhaler
Waller's Balance Inhaler
Collingwood's Inhaler

References

^ ^a ^b Shearer, WM. M. (1960). "The Evolution of Premedication". British Journal of Anaesthesia 32 (11): 554–562. doi:10.1093/bja/32.11.554.
^ Enquirer (1862-11-29). "The Chloroform Committee". The British Medical Journal 2 (100): 573. doi:10.1136/bmj.2.100.573. JSTOR 25199328.
^ ^a ^b "Association Intelligence". The British Medical Journal 2 (2167): 107, 116–118. 1902-07-12. JSTOR 20272744.
^ Buxton, Dudley W. (1902-07-19). "Special Chloroform Committee". The British Medical Journal 2 (2168): 226. doi:10.1136/bmj.2.3214.226. JSTOR 20273050.
^ ^a ^b "Final Report Of Special Chloroform Committee". The British Medical Journal 2 (2584): 47–72. 1910-07-09. JSTOR 25291374.

External links

First report (page 116-118) years 1901-1902
Second report years 1902-1903
Third report years 1903-1904
Fourth report years 1904-1905
Fifth report years 1905-1906
Final report years 1910

Chloroform Committees and Commissions

1847	(Chloroform first used)

1864	Chloroform Committee (Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society). · See also: Clover bag

1877	The Glasgow Committee on Anæsthetics (British Medical Association)

1888	First Hyderabad Commissions (Surgeon-Major Lawrie of the Bengal Medical Service appointed by the Nizam: Mahbub Ali Khan, Asaf Jah VI). · See also: Lawrie's Apparatus

1889	Second Hyderabad Commission (Surgeon-Major Lawrie with T. Lauder Brunton FRS of St. Bartholomew's Hospital)

1891	British Medical Association Anæsthetics Committee (British Medical Association)

1893	The Lancet commissioned Dudley Buxton to implement a questionnaire to report deaths, the method of induction and the clinical stance of chloroform.

1901	The Special Chloroform Committee of the British Medical Association (British Medical Association)

1912	American Medical Association Committee on Anæsthesia (American Medical Association) - ban chloroform

The list shown in this table is referenced, to view its references see: Template:Chloroform committees and commissions.