20 



THE NEW YORK JOURNAL OF PHARMACY 



METHODS IN STUDYING MATE- 

 RIA MEDICA. 



C. W. Ballard, A. M., Ph.C. 



I have been asked many times if the 

 study of materia medica cannot be re- 

 duced to systematic form ; if there is 

 no method by which the essential facts 

 may be easily grasped and retained in 

 mind. I take this opportunity of re- 

 iterating and explaining the answers I 

 have given to these queries. 



We start with the great advantage 

 that these studies, from the standpoint 

 of the student, are regarded as useful 

 and necessary knowledge ; but he is 

 overcome with the multiplicity of de- 

 tail. He finally loses himself in a be- 

 wildering maze of facts and either 

 crams the material word for word, thus 

 losing sight of the corclating of one 

 fact to another, or gives it up entirely 

 after a vain attempt to commit every- 

 thing he hears to memory. A knowl- 

 edge of the essentials of pharmacology 

 would give the student a better chance 

 to reason out the therapeutic eflfects 

 of drugs from their action, but phar- 

 macology is a science in itself and there 

 is little to be gained by adding another 

 study to the already crowded phar- 

 macy curriculum unless we lengthen 

 the course. Undoubtedly this latter 

 means of solving many of the prob- 

 lems encountered in the schools, will 

 eventually be adopted. The history 

 of every school shows that there has 

 been an increase in the amount of time 

 required to obtain a diploma ; the in- 

 crease being made voluntarily or in- 

 voluntarily to comply with the require- 

 ments set by the Conference of Phar- 

 maceutical Faculties. 



Considering the subject of materia 

 medica we find that there are certain 



facts to be not^d in regard to each drug 

 studied. I might set forth these facts 

 in the following order : 



1. Official Latin Title (if official). 



2. Official English Title (if official). 



3. Synonyms, common names or trade 



names, 



4. Definition as set forth by the Phar- 



macopoeia. 



5. Botanical Family (if drug is of 



vegetable origin). 



6. Habitat (if drug is of vegetable 



origin). 



7. Important constituents. 



8. Action. 



9. Therapeutic uses. 



10. Preparations, their strength and 

 dose. 

 In my recitation work on the subject 

 I have urged the student to adopt this 

 or some other regular order of proce- 

 dure in studying each drug and not to 

 consider each in haphazard fashion. If 

 the topics of such regular order are 

 firmly fastened in one's memory he is 

 not as apt to omit some of the details 

 as would be the case if in one drug we 

 considered the action first, while in the 

 next we studied the definition first; 

 having no definite point for beginning 

 or ending and unnecessarily overtask- 

 ing the mind in trying to remember 

 what follows next. My experience has 

 been that when one has the mechanical 

 details of a certain order of topics so 

 well in mind that he does not have to 

 stop to remember what follows next, 

 he is less liable to waste his energy 

 over mechanical details and will thus 

 conserve energy for the more difficult 

 task of learning the real facts. This is 

 the first step in systematizing the study 

 and at the same time of covering the 

 whole field. 



