With the discovery of cocaine, Western medicine…

With the discovery of cocaine, Western medicine has been quick to exploit the possible uses of the coca plant.

Karl Koller (a close associate of Sigmund Freud, who will later write about cocaine) has experimented with cocaine as a local anesthetic for eye surgery.

In an infamous experiment in 1884, he experiments upon himself by applying a cocaine solution to his own eye and then pricking it with pins.

Prior to this discovery, he had tested solutions such as chloral hydrate and morphine as anesthetics in the eyes of laboratory animals without success.

Koller’s colleague Sigmund Freud is fully aware of the painkilling properties of cocaine, but Koller had recognized its tissue-numbing capabilities, and in 1884 demonstrates its potential as a local anesthetic to the medical community during a congress of the Heidelberg Ophthalmological Society on September 15, 1884.

Koller's findings are a medical breakthrough.

Prior to his discovery, performing eye surgery was difficult because the involuntary reflex motions of the eye to respond to the slightest stimuli.

Later, cocaine will also used as a local anesthetic in other medical fields such as dentistry.

Also in 1884, Jellinek demonstrates the effects of cocaine as a respiratory system anesthetic.