SUBCONJUNCTIVAL HEMORRHAGE DURING THE ADMINISTRATION OF RUTIN

Abstract

Rutin, a flavone glucoside first isolated in 1842, is found in many plants. Dr. James F. Couch of the Eastern Regional Research Laboratory, United States Department of Agriculture, noting the structural similarity of rutin to hesperidin, advanced the possibility of its use in the treatment of some forms of bleeding. As a result of a series of chemical investigations, he found that the unripe buckwheat leaf gave the highest yield of rutin, and this is the plant from which our present supply is extracted. Rutin was given in initial doses of 60 mg. daily to a series of 66 patients in the course of a clinical investigation. In the four months during which this study has been followed, in 2 of the patients who were taking the rutin there developed subconjunctival hemorrhages. During the same period, only 1 patient of a much larger group being treated similarly (with the exception