Blowing smoke up your ass — The history of the tobacco smoke enema.Shortly after the introduct

Blowing smoke up your ass — The history of the tobacco smoke enema.Shortly after the introduction of tobacco in Europe, physicians and so called “health experts” began to experiment with tobacco as a medicinal remedy.  By the 18th century doctors began to combine tobacco with one of the most popular medical procedures of the era, the enema (then called “clysters”).  At first physicians would smoke from a pipe and blow the second hand smoke into the patient’s rectum through a simple tube.  Later the process became much more advanced as special tobacco smoke enema kits were created which featured a bellows with an internal reservoir of burning tobacco.  By the mid 18th century the tobacco enema was a popular cure for typhus, cholera, and fevers.  Results varied.In 1774 two London physicians named Dr. William Hawes and Dr. Thomas Coogan experimented with the idea of using tobacco enemas to revive the those in cardiac arrest from drowning.  They theorized that the tobacco smoke would warm the person and stimulate circulation and respiration.  A group of like minded medical professionals joined Dr. Hawes and Coogan, forming an organization that would later become the Royal Humane society.  While the use of tobacco enemas probably did little to revive those in cardiac arrest, the group did developed the first methods of artificial respiration, a precursor of modern CPR techniques.In 1811 the English scientist Ben Brodie discovered that nicotine was a poisonous substances.  As a result, by the early 19th century most medicinal uses for tobacco fell by the wayside, tobacco enemas included.  -- source link

More pics about