and Treatment by Bacterial Paget's Disease Treated by the Pancreatic Ferments in the Treat- new Penetrating Power of Radium. Robert Abbey, 150 Physiological Action and Uses of of High-Frequency Method versus Alcohol and Plea for Static Electricity, 164 Practical Demonstrations, 654 apy. H. H. Roberts, 117 fantile Paralysis by Recum- of the Patient, 657 Treatment of Inebriety and Light Bath, Action of in Ner- Vous Diseases. T. D. Radiography of Fractures, 658 in Skin Diseases, 384 Report of the Electro-Therapeutic Results in Roentgen Therapy, 203 Ring, G. Oram.-Electro-Chemi- The Present Status of Elec- Ray in Rhinoscleroma, 370 in the Treatment of Lupus, and Metabolism, 434 in Diagnosing Certain Condi- in the Treatment of Lupus in Unresolved Pneumonia, 370 Under the Application of Treatment of Exophthalmic Routine Treatment and Compli- Saline Infusions in the Treatment Serum Treatment of Thyroidism, ΙΙΟ Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the Snow, M. L. H. Arnold.-Static Symposium on X-Ray Burns, 349 Points in the Sanitorium 102 Specific Immunity and Roentgen Alice B. Con- in Therapeutics, 50 Stover, G. H.-The Treatment of Strobell, Charles William.-The Suggestion as an Adjunct to Regular Therapeutics, 265 Retention Due to Prostatic En- Symposium on Roentgen Rays in Therapeutic Use of Alternative Thermotherapy, 375, 595 formity in Therapeutic Results, Symposium on X-Ray Burns, 349 Trypsin for the Cure of Cancer, 51 Under-Oxidation of the Blood, Unilateral Renal Hematuria, the Ureteral Calculi, 651 Use of X-Rays from the Point of Uviol Light, Action of the, on Vaccine Treatment of Tuberculo- on Waite, H. E.-Symposium Value of the Roentgen Ray as a Therapeutic Agent, 200 Wilson, Robert.-On the Use of Sinclair cussion by Dr. Effects on Living Tissue. H. E. Robertson, 45 in Diseases of the Blood and in Skin Diseases, 152 in Tuberculosis, 204 Treatment of Ringworm, 545 Ziegler, S. Lewis.-Electricity in EDITORIALS. Advanced Therapeutics, 99 American Medical Association at American Medical Editors' Asso- American Electro-Therapeutic As- sociation. 40, 100, 225, 419 Broader Conception of Radiant Coming Meetings Devoted to the Congrès International de Physi- Congress of Physiotherapy at Elements of Physical Therapeu- First Annual Meeting of the Importance of the Early Recogni- Meeting of the American Roent- Meeting of the American Electro- New Association Therapeutics, 147 of Physio- 11145 The Journal of Advanced Therapeutics VOL. XXV. JANUARY, 1907. No. I. ELECTRICITY IN JOINT AFFECTIONS.* BY HENRY W. FRAUENTHAL, A. C., M. D., NEW YORK. Physician and Surgeon-in-Chief of the Jewish Hospital for Deformities and Joint Diseases. In the vast fields of science as in the development of a new country, it is the work of the pioneer whose efforts and energies direct the vast army that follow-what districts and fields are most fruitful in return for labor and time expended. So, too, do those whose labor in special lines of medicine and surgery select the best from their scientific investigation to give to the vast army of general practitioners to use in their multitudinous labor in their daily work. It is especially true in the increased field of usefulness that has been found for electricity with the X-ray and radio-active bodies in the past ten years. I am restricting the scope of this paper to the use of our electrical armament in the diagnosis and therapeutical treatment of affections in and about the joints of the human body. I merely wish to present my own clinical experience together with the work of other observers that pertains to this restricted branch of electrical therapeutics, and by these results and findings to excite the interest of still other workers, knowing that they will secure quicker and better results in acute and chronic inflammation of joints, save suffering and expedite cures. 1. The X-ray has been of the greatest value in the determination of fractures that extend into the joint. 2. Subluxations of the joint. 3. Malformation. 4. Hypertrophic and atrophic bones at the point of articulation that change the normal function of the joint. 5. The various acute and chronic inflammations of the joint. * Read at the Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the American Electro-therapeutic Association at Philadelphia, September 19, 1906. 6. The appearance of the synovial sac. 7. The presence of foreign bodies, loose pieces of cartilage. 8. The sesamoid bones that develop in the tendons or ligaments of the joints and are sometimes taken for foreign bodies or fractures. Thus the X-ray gives us an ocular evidence that could not have been previously determined as accurately and in many cases not at all. The X-ray photo of a joint should always be taken in two directions, the one at right angles to the other, and the distance of the tube specified. In the present paper I will merely take up the most common forms of arthritis, i. e., tubercular, gouty, syphilitic, gonorrheal, atrophic and hypertrophic arthritis; the latter being generally classified under the meaningless term of rheumatoid arthritis. It is the intention of the author to make each of the forms of arthritis the subject of a separate paper in the future. Among the first observers to use electricity in the treatment of joints is R. Remak, 1856-later Danion (in his "Traitement des Affections Articulaires par l'Électricité," Paris, 1887, page 238) describes his success with this therapeutical measure. Leduc, in the Arch. d'Électricité Médicale, 1894, page 478, and in subsequent writing describes in scientific detail his personal success in the treatment of arthritis with electricity. C. Leo V. Marano, M. D., Australasian Medical Gazette, July, 1890, reports several cases of arthritis treated by electricity and says: "In subacute and chronic cases, however (mono- or poly-articular chronic rheumatism, arthritis deformans, stiffness of the joints following sprains, dislocations, or fractures near the joints, periarthritic swellings and the like)." Electricity stands unrivaled, and if you consider for a moment the modus operandi of each remedy ordinarily employed and that of electricity, you cannot help seeing the latter's superiority. Dr. F. W. Gwyer in an article on the treatment of fibrous anchylosis in the Annals of Surgery, August, 1893, gives an account of the use of the galvanic current in the treatment of several cases of anchylosis. The pain was immediately relieved, the range of motion increased, and part of the fibrous tissue absorbed. |