As a medical student in 1990 I saw a 79 year old woman in the emergency room with intractable nausea and vomiting.   Earlier that week she had seen her primary care physician for nausea and a mild cough.   Diagnosed with bronchitis,  she was given a prescription for erythromycin.  Her husband brought in her medications including digoxin which can cause nausea

when blood levels are too high.  A  markedly high level came back on the blood draw indicating  digitalis toxicity.  I spoke to her primary care physician who was unaware of her digoxin prescription; completely clueless that she was prescribed the foxglove plant extract by a cardiologist for an irregular heart beat.

Digitalis was first described by William Withering in 1785 for heart conditions and this is considered the beginning of modern therapeutics.  Sometime after…