abe, she
should have her diet restricted in meat, bread and milk, as well as
the cereals. Overeating during pregnancy should be carefully guarded
against, as emphasized in an earlier chapter. Deformities of the
pelvis, etc., should rule out a consideration of pregnancy.

While artificial painless childbirth by means of "twilight sleep" and
other similar methods all have their place; nevertheless, these
procedures should not lead to the neglect of those natural methods and
preventive practices which aid in preparing the normal expectant
mother for nature's relatively painless labor. When so much anesthesia
has to be used in a normal labor, it cannot but strongly suggest that
both patient and physician have neglected those common but efficient
methods which contribute indirectly to lessening the pangs of child
bearing.

WHAT IS TWILIGHT SLEEP?

"Twilight sleep" is a recent term which has become associated in the
public mind with "painless labor." The reader should understand that
"twilight sleep" is not a new method of obstetric anesthesia. While
this method of inducing "painless labor" has been brought prominently
before the public mind in recent years by much discussion and by
numerous magazine articles--being often presented in such a way as
sometimes to lead the uninstructed layman to infer that a new method
of obstetric anesthesia had just been discovered--it has,
nevertheless, been known and more or less used since 1903. Later known
as the "Freiburg Method," and as the "Dammerschlaf" of Gauss, and
still later popularized as "twilight sleep," this "scopolamin-morphin"
method of obstetric anesthesia, has gained wide attention and acquired
many zealous advocates.

"Twilight sleep" is, therefore, nothing new--it is simply a revival of
the old combination of _scopolamin_ and _morphin_ anesthesia. While
many different methods of administering "twilight sleep" have been
devised, the following general plan will serve to inform the reader
sufficiently regarding the technic of this much-talked-of procedure.

The scopolamin must always be fresh, although different forms of the
drug are used. It tends quickly to decompose--forming a toxic
by-product--and, according to some authorities, this decomposed
scopolamin is responsible for many undesirable results which have
attended some cases of "twilight sleep." Various forms of morphin are
also used, as also is narcophin.

TECHNIC OF "TWILIGHT SLEEP"

The "twilight-sle