82 JOHN" T. HALSEY 



substances could influence the function of one or more of the other endocrin 

 organs, widened our conception of the fashion in which these substances 

 produce their effects. 



Not so very long ago it seemed well to classify the therapeutic employ- 

 ment of the endocrin gland preparations under the two headings of organo- 

 therapy and hormonotherapy. By organotherapy was meant their em- 

 ployment in conditions in which the effects appeared to be due to a replace- 

 ment of or making good of a deficiency of the internal secretion of the 

 patient's own endocrin organ or organs, while the term hormonotherapy 

 was used to include their use in conditions in which they appeared to 

 act by virtue of their possession of pharmacodynamic powers strictly com- 

 parable to those possessed by ordinary drugs. In this article the term 

 organotherapy will be used to include all the uses of endocrin prepara- 

 tions except such as appear to rest purely on empiricism and those which 

 appear to be based on their pharmacodynamic powers. 



Borchardt (c) has recently attempted to define and give a name to the 

 various fashions in which endocrin products produce their therapeutic 

 effects. "While the attempt does not appear to have been altogether suc- 

 cessful his discussion is interesting and helpful, and for that reason is 

 reproduced here in very much abbreviated form. This writer defines and 

 classifies the various types of organotherapy and hormonotherapy as fol- 

 lows: 1. Substitutional hormonotherapy, the administration of endocrin 

 preparations to overcome the effects of a deficiency or disturbance of the 

 function of this same gland, as, for example, the administration of thyroid 

 substance in a case of myxedema. 2. Vicarious (durch Wechselwirkung) 

 hormonotherapy, in which the administration of a preparation of one 

 gland compensates for, or overcomes the effects of, dysfunction of another 

 endocrin organ. Examples of this type of therapy are the thymus treat- 

 ment of exophthalmic goiter, and the thyroid treatment of tetany. 3. Hor- 

 monal immunotherapy, such as the use of Moebius' serum in Graves' dis- 

 ease. 4. Hormonal ferment therapy where the glandular product acts by 

 virtue of its ferment content, as in the use of pancreas preparations for 

 their action in the alimentary canal. 5. Pharmacodynamic hormono- 

 therapy, in which the effects produced are the results of the exertion of 

 pharmacodynamic powers possessed by the endocrin preparation. The 

 treatment of asthma by suprarenal substance and the induction of labor 

 by the administration of pituitrin are instances of this type of therapy. 

 Borchardt v ~ believes that endocrin substances may exert a therapeutic ac- 

 tion in still a sixth fashion, namely, by activating the protoplasm so as to 

 increase its ability to form antibodies, an effect comparable to that result- 

 ing from the injection of foreign protein and speaks of this as hormonal 

 therapy through augmentation of function (leistung-steigernde Ther-^ 



* See Addendum ; p. 150. 



