a. and sb. Phys. [f. prec.]
A. adj. 1. Acting upon the walls of the blood-vessels, so as to produce constriction or dilatation of these and thus regulate or affect the flow of blood. Chiefly with nerve and center.
(a) 1868. Spencer, Princ. Psychol., I. vi. (1870), I. 115. The feelings that go along with discharges into the vaso-motor and sympathetic nerves, are the predominant ones.
1871. Hammond, Dis. Nervous Syst., 65. Certain medicines are causes of cerebral anæmia,… by their action on the vaso-motor nerves.
1876. Bristowe, Th. & Pract. Med. (1878), 41. The muscular tissue of the vascular system … is under the dominance of … the nerves of the vaso-motor system.
(b) 1865. Intell. Observ., No. 47. 390. The vaso-motor centres.
1875. H. C. Wood, Therap. (1879), 355. In large doses lobelia seems to paralyze the vaso-motor centres.
1897. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., IV. 641. It also excites the vaso-motor centre, and thus leads to rise in the blood-pressure.
2. Affecting the vaso-motor nerves or centers.
1879. St. George’s Hosp. Rep., IX. 677. The ophthalmoscope … yielded evidence of arterial relaxation, pointing to slight vaso-motor paralysis.
1881. Trans. Obstet. Soc. Lond., XXII. 23. Were the phenomena due to peripheral irritation reflected from the cord in the form of motor and vaso-motor disturbance?
1897. Trans. Amer. Pediatric Soc., IX. 195. Marked vaso-motor symptoms, and optic-nerve atrophy.
B. sb. A vaso-motor nerve.
1887. A. M. Brown, Anim. Alkaloids, 47. Marked heat and injection of the ear helices from paralysis of vaso-motor.
1899. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., VIII. 726. Hydrotherapeutic methods,… directed primarily to the cutaneous vaso-motors.
Hence Vaso-motorial a., Vaso-motorially adv., Vaso-motory a.
1877. M. Foster, Physiol., 145. The vaso-motorial functions of the cervical sympathetic.
1897. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., IV. 282. The effects of the latter experiment may be explained as a result of vaso-motorial influence. Ibid. (1899), VI. 28. A considerable number of instances of the purest vasomotory angina.
1901. Lancet, 8 June, 1627/1. The most efficacious way of increasing the urinary flow vaso-motorially.
