Matters of Medical Interest

A CONVICT PHYSICIAN.-A physician who is serving a life sentence for murder in Georgia has been put in charge of the convict camps at West Holmes and Coffey.

EMIGRANTS BARRED.-Two hundred emigrants booked from Liverpool to Philadelphia were debarred from landing because of the discovery by the ship's surgeon of the existence of trachoma.

MAY BUILD HOSPITAL.-Mason City, Ia., has offered to give $50,000 to the Sisters of Mercy of Dubuque if they will furnish $30,000 additional toward the establishment of a hospital.

PLANTS.-Plants usually contain a number of medicinal principles besides various inorganic substances. It will be seen, therefore, that no single derivative from a plant, however potent its action under certain conditions, can properly represent that plant or exercise such a far-reaching, comprehensive influence over the system. We all know, for instance, that while morphine acts well in certain cases, opium itself, acts better in others. And there are other alkaloids derived from opium, codeine, heroin, papaverine, etc., all having a difference in action and none can replace preparations made from the gum, itself. There are a few plants such as opium cinchona and nux vomica whose alkaloids have a decided action; others have very little virtue. Phytolaca for instance is one of our best remedies, but to get the benefit of it it is necessary to use a fluid preparation made from the fresh root. Phytolaccin by no means represents its medicinal properties. The same is true of stillingia. A tincture made from the green root is curative in syphilis as was demonstrated during the civil war but stillingin is a feeble negative agent. Digitalin cannot compare in therapeutic efficacy with the tincture or infusion of the plant. Hare says it ought not to be used at all. A plant is a compound of medicinal agents prepared in the laboratory of Nature and just as in some cases we obtain better results from writing a prescription which shall contain a base, an auxillary, a corrective substance, and a vehicle designed to promote assimilation so we often obtain much better results from fluid preparations which contain all the active principles and medicinal substances, organic and inorganic, present in the plant. The few striking instances in which alkaloids make a decided impression, are apt to convey a false idea of their general utility. The physician will have to learn to discriminate here as elsewhere. Some of the alkaloids are invaluable in their place, others are worthless or nearly so. The future of therapeutics is largely bound up with the study of plant life and how to get at the medical properties locked up in them; therefore it is vitally important that the profession should not be carried away by mistaken ideas as to what form of medicine they shall employ in making use of the agents obtained from Nature's storehouse. Some physicians are under the impression that plant remedies are necessarily more or less feeble and fugitive agents. The facts are that they act quickly, decidedly, and are easy to eliminate. They contain inorganic substances, such as sodium, potassium, calcium, etc., in organic combination, admittedly the most scientific form for their administration, and are a factor in the remarkable efficacy of a carefully made preparation of any plant.-Ex.

R. L. MAUPIN, President,

O. F. PEARSON, Vice-President.

Dr. BRANSFORD LEWIS, 2d Vice-Pres.

THE

J. A. NORTON, Secretary.
G. L. WILLIAMS, Treasurer.
H. B. COCKE, Auditor.

Financial Statement at the Close of Business December 31, 1904.

The Company's Savings Bonds pay 5 per cent interest annually. payments of One Dollar per week and over.

$350,000.00

Odd Fellows' Building, St. Louis, Mo.

Bonds sold on partial

Deposited with the Treasurer of the State of Missouri for the protection of bondholders. BEING THE LARGEST STATE DEPOSIT OF ANY SIMILAR COMPANY IN THE WORLD. For particulars, call on or address the Company,

CREAM

Baking Powder.

ABSOLUTELY PURE AND WHOLESOME.

Dr. Price's Cream Baking Powder is made from cream of tartar, a product of the grape, and the most healthful of all fruit acids.

Dr. Price's Baking Powder raises the bread without fermentation, and without affecting or changing the constituents of the flour.

Fresh bread, cake, biscuit, griddlecakes, etc., raised with Dr. Price's Baking Powder, may be eaten by persons of dys peptic tendencies or the most sensitive stomachs without distressing results.

Food for the sick requiring to be leavened is made more nutritious and healthful by the use of this leavening agent than by yeast or other baking powder.

NOTE Cheap and imitation baking powders are recommended and their sale pushed by certain grocers because of the greater profit in them. These imitation powders almost invariably are made of alum. Alum costs but two cents a pound, while cream of tartar costs over thirty cents. Alum is employed simply because it is cheap, but every physician knows that the use of this corrosive poison in food is at the cost of health. Think of nursing mothers, delicate girls and sickly children being fed on food made with alum!

My desire and aim have been to utter nothing but the truth. I have no love for error in any form or in any field of knowledge.-Hiram Christopher,

The Medical Herald.

[Discussion of Current Topics invited in this department.

The Editors assume no responsibility for the views expressed by correspondents.]

THE PRESENT POSITION OF THE SURGERY OF THE HYPERTROPHIED PROSTATE.

J. William White (Annals of Surgery) compares his present views of prostatic surgery with those he entertained ten years ago. Regarding the etiology of hypertrophy of the prostate, the theory of gonorrheal origin is well supported, and demands further investigation, but the weight of evidence is against it. Prognosis and proper treatment depend upon the determination of the cause of the enlargement. Secondary bladder changes are due to mechanical obstruction of the flow of urine, circulatory disturbance and septic infection. Nothing new in prostate symptomatology has been added during the past ten years. In considering the indications for treatment it is well to determine (a) whether the enlargement is soft (glandular) or hard (fibroid); (b) the seat of the growth, median, lateral, or general; (c) the presence or absence of general arteriosclerosis; (d) the condition of the viscid mucosa and of the upper urinary tract as to pyogenic infection. Expectant treatment should be limited to those cases in which there are no symptoms, no residual urine and in which catheterism is easy. Excepting urinary antiseptics for bladder infection there is no medical treatment for prostatic hypertrophy. Palliative treatment still consists in the use of sounds and the catheter. These are of value in a limited number of cases, but the tendency of the times is toward earlier radical measures. Dilatation if used in the early stages relieves local congestion and tumefaction, lessens the viscid irritability, diminishes the amount of residual urine and modifies favorably the whole course of the disease. Catheterism should be employed in cases in which the quantity