96 



PAET III.* 



TREATMENT OF E. HISTOLYTICA AND OTHER PROTOZOAL 

 INFECTIONS OF THE HUMAN INTESTINE. 



This part of the report is devoted to a consideration of the 

 action of drugs on the various intestinal protozoal infections met 

 with in man in Alexandria. The chief objective was the treatment 

 and cure of E. histolytica infections, but as many of them were 

 mixed with other protozoal infections it was possible to watch on 

 these also the action of emetin or other drugs employed. The 

 various protozoa, as regards their behaviour under treatment, will 

 be now considered, while the charts showing the courses of the 

 various infections in the individual cases treated appear at the end 

 of the report. 



(1) Treatment of Entamceba histolytica Infections. 



The line of treatment adopted for E. histolytica infections has 

 been almost exclusively the administration of emetin hydrochloride 

 either by subcutaneous injection or by the mouth. In a few cases 

 we have given methyl emetin sulphate which was prepared by 

 Dr. Pyman, Director of the Chemical Research Laboratories, 

 Wellcome Bureau of Scientific Research, and kindly placed at 

 our disposal by him. One case which resisted emetin treatment 

 was given treatment by pulv. ipecac, and later by thymol. 



The majority of the cases have been healthy carriers who were 

 mostly discovered during the routine examination of men in camps 

 as explained earlier in this paper. Some of these were encountered 

 during the examination of hospital cases which had been admitted 

 for various reasons. In addition to the carriers a smaller number 

 of cases of actual amoebic dysentery were treated, and by amoebic 

 dysentery we mean a condition associated with the occurrence of 

 blood and mucus in the stool with the presence of amoebae showing 

 definite included red blood corpuscles. We have included no 

 doubtful cases in this list, such as might possibly be bacillary 

 dysentery with free forms of E. coli, but all have been undoubted 

 cases of E. histolytica infection which have been diagnosed accord- 

 ing to the system explained in another part of the paper. 



* Reprinted from the Journal of the Boy al Army Medical Corps, April-May, 1917. 



