POSOLOGY

(Yunanca köken — orijinale bakınız.) In Medicine, that which relates to the doses or quantities in which medicines should be administered. POSTMORTEM, (hat. after death.) In Anatomy, the technical phrase signifying the inspection and examination of the dead body, in order to determine the cause of death: it is also applied to the appearances presented, and more especially to some phenomena which are constantly noticed shortly after death. Thus, the muscles retain their property of contracting under the influence of stimuli applied to them, or to their nerves, for some time after death; and when they have lost this irritability, they spontaneously pa into a state of contraction, producing a general stiffening of the body, which is called "post-mortem rigidity," or " rigor mort is." POT-MF, [s. 1411]