The knowledge that a man can use is the only real knowledge; the only knowledge that has The Medical World C. F. TAYLOR, M.D., Editor and Publisher. Entered at the Philadelphia Post-Office as Second-Class Matter. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: To any part of the United States or Mexico, ONE DOLLAR AND FIFTY CENTS per HOW TO REMIT: For their own protection we advise We cannot always supply back numbers. Should a num- Notify us promptly of any change of address, mentioning both old and new addresses. The year is new; but the world remains It was a valuable lesson, worth getting While I am writing these lines the cal- So. Conventionally we have agreed that Naturally, in our hemisphere, the new Seasons of special good cheer, and the ness to look forward to (specially important to the children), and certain events are imprest upon our minds-and possibly into our lives. And December 25th is just as good as any, and perhaps better, to celebrate as the birth of Jesus. Then our minds are turned to Palestine, because so much of good came from there. But there is good in every country-let us increase it. And what a happy world we would have if Christmas would last all the year round. "Every land a Palestine, and Christmas all the year." You see I have not said a word about New Year's resolutions. If we take proper care of each new day as it comes, the year will be all right. And so with every year. The Modified Brand Treatment in Typhoid Fever. Altho the so-called Brand method of treatment in typhoid fever has unquestionably reduced the mortality of this disease in hospital practise, it has never proven popular with the profession engaged in private practise, nor is it appreciated by the patients who are subjected to it. Brand did not originate the use of cold water in typhoid fever. Dr. Robert Jackson used it in 1774; Dr. Wright, a West Indian physician, in 1777; James Currie, a ship surgeon of England, in 1797; Dr. Nathan Smith, of New Haven, in 1798; and Dr. Hiram Corson, of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, in 1828, continued its use in his prac.ise for over fifty years. Brand, however, popularized it by his writings in 1861, and it was enthusiastically taken up by the hospitals of the world. Despite the excellent results recorded, it failed to gain in popularity among the physicians in private practise, and, in that field, has practically passed out of use. The failure to recognize the fact that the use of water in typhoid fever is a valuable remedial agent which cannot be replaced by any other method or drug, is unfortunate. This neglect has been partly due to the fact that many physicians saw no further into the effects of the cold bath than the reduction of temperature, and felt that temperature could be reduced more easily by drugs. This habit led to an abuse of the coal-tar line of chemicals, with unquestioned harm to patients. Water, properly employed, in typhoid fever, has a wider range of usefulness than mere temperature reduction, and has an effect in reducing mortality in those cases which never manifest an alarmingly high temperature. Its greatest effect is in the stimulation of the nervous system, in the determination of the blood to the peripheral circulation, in increast digestiv powers, in checking emaciation, and in adding to the comfort of the patient. Dr. Thompson's practise is to use the tub bath at 75 degrees whenever the patient's temperature reaches 102.5 degrees, insisting on gentle and continuous friction. of the skin by two nurses during the entire continuation of the bath. While fifteen minutes is the ordinary duration of the bath, he has found it beneficial, in many cases, to limit the bath to eight or ten minutes, and to have the temperature at 80 degrees. He gives an alcoholic stimulant twenty minutes before the bath. Dr. James Tyson insists on having the patient void urin before entering the tub, and usually prefers a temperature of 70 degrees. Brisk rubbing is kept up during the bath, and an ice cap is kept on the head. If the temperature has returned to a point as high as 102.2 degrees three hours after the bath, it is repeated. If it is 102 degrees or above 101 degrees when taken three hours after the bath, the bath is given an hour later; if 101 degrees or above 100 degrees, the bath is given two hours later; and if below 100 degrees and above normal, it is given in three hours. It is given at any time when the temperature reaches 102.2 degrees if three hours have elapst after a previous bath. No more than eight baths are ever given in the twenty-four hours. Dr. Alfred Stengel's rules are: Take temperature, pulse, and respiration rate every three hours. Use the sponge bath at temperature of 101.2 degrees; the tub bath at 102.4 degrees. Temperature of water, 70 degrees. Ice caps to head continually. The tub is only used in those cases presenting definitness of symptoms; those that begin in a mild way are not tubbed unless some especial manifestation arise. If the patient is very nervous, or does not bear the bath well, it is discontinued. It is not used in case of children. Dr. Musser has the temperature, pulse, and respiration rate taken every two hours. He employs the sponge when temperature is found at 102 degrees, and the tub bath at 103 degrees. The bath is begun at a temperature of 80 degrees, and it is then gradually reduced to 70 degrees. Ice cap to head continually. He takes the temperature during the bath, and again fifteen minutes following. Leibermeister, forty years ago, advised the warm bath at 90 degrees, gradually cooled. Dr. Reiss, of Berlin, uses the warm bath at 88 degrees for several hours at a time, or until the rectal temperature falls to 100 degrees. Many use the ice cap to the head as a routine measure when the temperature reaches 101 degrees. The Duty of Every Physician Regarding the Owen Bill Now Before the U. S. Congress. After many years of hard work by many good and self-sacrificing men, it is now possible for us to say that there is a bill before Congress looking to the establishment of a Department of Public Health. It will not be easy to pass it, and every physician who loves his profession and who seeks to do his full duty to his fellow-man, should put his shoulder to the wheel immediately. Already there is determined and powerful opposition to the passage of the bill. This opposition is the more dangerous since it has organized under the caption of "The National League for Medical Freedom," and by this means is making a bid for the support of the ignorant. It is amazing to find as officials in this "league" men who have heretofore stood for everything which tended to benefit mankind. Their attitude in this instance is only explainable on the hypothesis of ignorance, for this bill does not in any way or manner propose to limit medical freedom in any manner. The only parts of the bill which could be misconstrued into an expression indicating that it might be possible that quackery and charlatanism would be interfered with at some time, are the second and seventh sections. The second section deals with the proposition to unify under a Secretary of Public Health the various medical, surgical, biological, and sanitary services, which are now working under different departments of the government. The seventh section, which embodies the main purpose of the bill, is as follows: "That it shall be the duty and province of such a Department of Health to supervise all matters within the control of the Federal Government relating to public health and to diseases of animal life." Can any one find any intention implied in either of these, sections to indicate that the medical freedom of any one is to be limited? We think no one can, for it is not there. An effort is being made to enlist rancor on the part of the homeopaths against the bill, but we feel that the intelligent and progressiv homeopath will not lend himself to any such chicanery, for he knows, quite as well as any, how great would be the benefits of a Department of Health under the control of the Federal Government. It is said that the dope mixers are back of the finances of the "league"; but we are quite reliably informed that the money comes from Christian science sources. The antivivisectionists will be found opposing this bill, as will all other hysterical "anti's" who are opposed to everything good and sensible, unless it is to be brought about by means of their own pet fads. Let every doctor write (and you better drop a postal as soon as you have read this) to your congressman or senator, asking for a copy of this bill. When it comes, study it well; and if you approve of its purposes and aims (and you will), again write to both your congressman and your senators urging the passage of the Owen bill. Don't depend on their having enuf sense or intelligence to see that it is a good thing. Don't imagin that it is so sound a measure that it You have no concannot fail to pass. ception of influences and pressure that will be brought to bear on every congressman and senator to induce him to prove recalcitrant to the interests of the people and to vote the bill down or to emasculate it before passage. We know, personally, that the most prominent Republican figure in the House is unalterably opposed to any such measure. radical and unreasonable is he on this matter that he would not even argue it with the physician members of Congress. It is a source of gratification to many progressiv people of all parties that his influence in the next house will not be so czar-like as it has been. Now, doctors, get busy; and while you are writing, write to the Committee of One Hundred on National Health, 105 East 22d St., New York City, N. Y., for any information they can send you. So Fifteen drops each of hydrogen peroxid and glycerin, given every two hours, are of positiv value in diphtheria ("membranous croup'), tonsillitis, and anginoid sore throat. The Brave Stand of the “Druggists' Circular." The Druggists' Circular, in its November issue, contains as the leading editorial a dissertation "As to Dispensing by Physicians," which we wish our subscribers could read. We do not have space for it all, but reprint extracts which bear strongly upon features of weight in the contest now on between druggists and dispensing physicians. The editorial was called forth by a communication from H. Rubin, a druggist of Brooklyn, N. Y., who said, among other things: We pharmacists, if we wish to amount to anything, must unite to have a law passed prohibiting physicians from dispensing unless the patient is not within reach of a pharmacy, or in emergency cases. The pharmacists must understand that they can expect very little help from physicians, and it is up to them to help themselves. A certain pharmaceutical society has appointed a committee to devise means to help pharmacists. My suggestion to it is to see that we have legislation along the line suggested in this letter. The editor replied with advice which, while intended for the pharmacist alone, serves to reveal to the physician who reads it that there is a pharmaceutic editor who knows what is right between man and man, and who is not afraid to urge it, even in the very face of the overwhelming sentiment now rampant among the druggists. He says: Notwithstanding the fact that the drugs carried by many dispensing physicians are notoriously of a very low grade, we are of the opinion that it is not feasible, and would not be fair to the public, to have a law passed prohibiting a physician from administering to his patient such remedies as he might see fit, when and where and in any manner his knowledge and skill might dictate. To speak of robbing the physician by law of his right to administer remedies to his patient is pueril, and to undertake to put such an idea into execution would be preposterous. The fact that the physician himself is the final human arbiter of what is best for his patient makes it difficult for the law to assume to say even what quality of drugs he should carry in stock, and, as it seems to us, out of the question for it to try to dictate when and in what dilution or combination these drugs should be administered. Not only does it seem to us to be useless for druggists to antagonize physicians in the matter of dispensing or in other matters of common interest, but it seems suicidal. It will be a good day for the public when physicians and pharmacists get together, and the former agree to throw away their stale tablets and low grade supplyhouse tinctures and extracts, and pharmacists agree to stop selling morphin-laden cough syrups, fake "kidney cures," and quack gonorrhea mixtures. Will his advice be taken? We fear that it will not. The concerted effort being made in many states to enact a law prohibiting the physician from dispensing, and to take from him the privilege of writing the death certificate, and placing this function in the hands of the druggists, speaks too plainly to be misunderstood. Preposterous and ridiculous as this movement is, and suicidal as it is, the druggists seem determined on it. They seem to have learned nothing from their fatal experience with the nostrum makers, and to have determined to complete the obsequies of the death and burial of all their business interests by this supreme folly. The repeated publication, in all the leading pharmaceutical papers, of Beal's scurrilous screed referred to on page 440 of the November WORLD, proves the animus now actuating them. Scarcely less foolish than the pharmacist is the physician who ignores these activities, and makes no effort to impress upon his state representativ and senator the fact that the medical profession is very much alive to the facts, and that they will not tolerate for fering with their rights or privileges. a moment any legislativ enactment interWrite to them and insist that they take a rational stand on this matter, in the interest of all of the people, instead of the comparativly small class of druggists. Business Talk to Doctors. My Business Talk mail does not grow any less. Oil stock and mining stock propositions have almost disappeared (doctors have at last learned that almost a sure way to throw away their money is to put it into such propositions), but many other kinds of propositions have appeared to take the place of oil and mines. Wireless was one, and many were indignant at my expressions concerning Wireless many months ago. I wonder how they feel now about it. In many communities much money went into Wireless that should have been used to pay doctor bills. So many doctors who did not lose directly lost indirectly. And this is a point that should be realized by the few doctors who say that these Talks are of no benefit to them, because they never put money into such things-they are "too smart." But they are not smart enuf to know that much money goes into such so-called "investments' that should go into their pockets. So if you don't need these Talks yourself, use them to warn your patrons |