ˌcounter-ˈirritant
[f. counter- 3 + irritant.]
Med. A medical appliance used to produce irritation of the surface of the body, in order to counteract disease of more deeply-seated or distant parts. Also fig.
| 1854 Macaulay Biog., Bunyan (1860) 36 Counter-irritants are of as great use in moral as in physical diseases. 1876 Geo. Eliot Dan. Der. IV. lxix. 336 She afforded him no counter-irritant. 1889 Boy's Own Paper 24 Aug. 747/2, I felt as if a flogging would even be welcome as a counter-irritant to mental pain. |
So counter-ˈirritate v. trans.; counter-irriˈtation, irritation artificially produced in order to counteract the action of disease.
| 1864 in Webster, Counter-irritate, -irritation. 1882 Syd. Soc. Lex., Counter-irritation, the production of irritation, redness, vesication, or destruction of the skin, for the purpose of favourably influencing diseases of deeper seated or distant parts, by modifying the nutrition or mode of action of their structures. |