A Historical View of Motion Sickness-A Plague at Sea and on Land, Also with Military Impact.

Seasickness and its triggers, symptoms, and preventive measures were well known in antiquity. This chapter is based on an analysis of descriptions of motion sickness, in particular seasickness, in ancient Greek, Roman, and Chinese literature. A systematic search was made from the Greek period beginning with Homer in 800 BC to the late Roman period and ending with Aetios Amidenos in 600 AD, as well as in the Chinese medical classics dating from around 300 AD.

Motion sickness in ancient China: Seasickness and cart-sickness.

Objective: To find and analyze descriptions of motion sickness in Chinese historical sources.

Methods: Databases and dictionaries were searched for various terms for seasickness and travel sickness, which were then entered into databases of full texts allowing selection of relevant passages from about the third to the 19th century ad.

Results: Already in 300 ad the Chinese differentiated cart-sickness, particularly experienced by persons from the arid north of China, from a ship-illness experienced by persons from the south, where rivers were important for transportation and travel.

What the ancient Greeks and Romans knew (and did not know) about seasickness.

Objective: To find and analyze descriptions in ancient Greek and Roman literature that reveal what was known at the time about seasickness.

Methods: A systematic search was made in the original literature beginning in the Greek period with Homer in ca 800 bc and extending up to Aetios Amidenos in the late Roman period in ca 600 ad.

Results: Rough seas and unpleasant odors were recognized as the major triggers; susceptibility was greater in persons not adapted to sea travel, of a labile mental state, or with anxiety; nausea, emesis, vertigo, anorexia, faintness, apathy, headache, and impending doom were frequently reported symptoms.

Hemispheric synchronized sounds and perioperative analgesic requirements.

Background: Data on the effect of Hemisync sounds on perioperative analgesic requirements are scant.

Methods: We randomized surgical outpatients into a treatment group that received Hemisync sounds (n = 20), a music group that received music (n = 20), and a control group that had a blank cassette tape (n = 20). All subjects underwent a controlled standardized propofol-nitrous-vecuronium and fentanyl general anesthesia.