Doctor’s Birthing Kit

Doctor’s Birthing Kit

Anesthesia, Obstetrical

Labor, Obstetric

Labor Pain

Childbirth

Scopolamine

Chloroform

The objects inside this kit indicate that the original owner was probably an obstetrician who may have been a practitioner of Dämmerschlaf or “Twilight Sleep.” A combination of morphine, to mitigate pain, and scopolamine to cause amnesia, was given by injection to women in labor. It caused many women to forget their labor pain, but the drug combination could also cause extreme or violent behavior. In 1914, reports of “pain free” deliveries in Europe gave rise in the U.S. to the National Twilight Sleep Association, which successfully campaigned for the widespread adoption of the technique.

Anesthesia kit collected by Bert B. Hershenson, MD, Director of Anesthesia at the Boston Lying-In Hospital.

1910, circa

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Warren Anatomical Museum

object

1 kit with 6 objects inside

Medical Instruments, Equipment, and Devices

physical object

Warren Anatomical Museum Catalog Number: 22034