For year ending Nov. 30 MASS. STATE SANATORIUM AT RUTLAND. 5 123 26. 50. 40 10 105 22. the time the deaths were very few, failing patients leaving, the deaths are included in the tables as "not improved." Where the incipient class had been divided into two grades, "incipient" and "well-marked incipient," and 81.4 per cent. of arrests had been noted for the highest grade of incipients, the uniting of the two grades into one, as is generally done, brings the percentage down to 59. The separate calculation of the percentage of incipient cases which are apparently cured is exceedingly important, because they are the curable cases, while the cure of a far-advanced case is exceedingly rare. If, for instance, an institution contained 10 incipient and 90 far-advanced cases, the percentage of apparent cures among the incipients might be quite large, while that among all cases would necessarily be exceedingly small. By good rights, hopeless cases ought not to be treated in the same institution with those for whom there is some chance for cure, if the best results are MASS. STATE SANATORIUM AT RUTLAND. Number of Patients Discharged and Percentages in HOMOEOPATHIC SERVICE desired. The natural depression acts unfavorably. The numbers in the tables which are not percentages represent the "considered" patients discharged. Those who have remained too, short a time-a month, more or less-to be of service statistically, are not "considered" in the tables. In the early years the homoeopathic service preferred the term "apparently cured" for its best results, and the regular service preferred the word "arrested," and yet both terms were designed to mean exactly the same condition. While the statistics were kept by the so-called "Rutland Classification," therefore, these terms were used synonymously. Later, however, when for purposes of comparison with institutions all over the country the "National Association Classification" was adopted, the term "apparently cured" denoted the best grade of results, and "arrested" the second grade. Naturally some of the apparent cures or arrests must be expected to relapse, especially if the patient lives improperly or returns to unhygienic surroundings. COMPARATIVE PERCENTAGES. The following percentages, gathered from the foregoing tables, represent clearly and emphatically the superior results obtained on the Homeopathic side. "One swallow does not make a summer," and a few cases of any one disease, e.g. 25 or 50 or 100, are not a sufficient number from which to draw trustworthy deductions. But when about 6000 "considered" cases are treated in the same institution, side by side, during a period of 111⁄2 years, with such results as are here shown, the food, air, water, exercise, rest, and, in fact, all the surroundings being exactly the same, and nothing being different, except the medication, the most skeptical must admit that these figures mean something. MASS. STATE SANATORIUM AT RUTLAND. Percentages by "RUTLAND" Classification "Apparently Cured" or "Arrested" (Here used synonymously to indicate the best class in results) Percentages by "NATIONAL ASSOCIATION Classification "Apparently Cured" (1st Class) and "Arrested" (2d Class) Combined NOTES ON ANTERIOR POLIOMYELITIS. BY FRANK C. RICHARDSON, M.D., Professor of Neurology, Boston University School of Medicine. The medical profession of today is confronted with the somewhat alarming prevalence of a disease which, although known for many years, had hitherto been considered of sporadic occurrence, and the people are anxiously awaiting some assurance of its prevention and cure. The literature upon Anterior Poliomyelitis has during the past three years been most voluminous and is available for careful study. Such study must inevitably lead to the conclusion that epidemics of this disease have very greatly increased in several parts of the world in a measure not to be explained in any way by the increased interest in the subject. The various State Boards of Health, notably those of New York and Massachusetts, have in recent years conducted thorough and painstaking investigation of epidemics occurring within their jurisdiction, and their reports embody all the recent knowledge of poliomyelitis; therefore it would surely be a work of supererogation to burden you at this time with a lengthy essay upon a disease with which you are already well acquainted. In the following paper no attempt will be made to exploit startling theories or new facts. Its raison d'etre is that the writer in the capacity of neurologist has been afforded opportunity for the observation of a considerable number of cases of infantile paralysis, and it was thought that a first hand recital of personal experience might be of interest and possibly of value. The cases referred to were detached cases occurring in various parts of New England and may perhaps be regarded as more representative of the disease than a series of cases taken from a localized epidemic which are apt to present certain characteristics due to environment. An analysis of seventeen cases which while in the acute stage have come under the writer's direct observation affords conclusions that conform for the most part to those deduced from reports issued by the various State Boards. Without wearying you with statistical data, which are available for your leisure perusal, it may not be without interest to discuss some of the salient clinical features of this dread disease. That we are dealing with an acute disease produced by some external agent-that is, the fact of its infectious characterseems well proven. The source of infection and the medium of its introduction is as yet unsettled. In no one of the writer's cases was it possible to trace a cause, the disease occurring in previously |