22 GENERAL THERAPEUTICS FOR VETERINARIANS 



As a basis for treatment, Virchow's theory requires that medi- 

 cines must exert a local action upon the diseased organ or its cells 

 (cellular therapy, localized therapy). 



9. THE SERUM THERAPY OF VON BEHRING 



Definition of Serum Therapy. — The etiological investigation of 

 the infectious diseases begun by Pasteur and Koch resulted in an 

 etiological therapy, which was first used by Lister in surgery (anti- 

 septic treatment of wounds). This etiological principle was intro- 

 duced in internal medicine especially by von Behring. His system, 

 because of its specific, pronounced humoral pathological character, 

 is the direct opposite of the cellular pathology theory. According 

 to von Behring, in the course of infectious diseases in the animal or 

 human body chemical bodies are formed, especially in the blood- 

 serum, which can be employed not only as protectives but also as 

 curative agents against these diseases. The so-called antitoxins 

 are specific antidotes to the poisons (toxins) and bacteria of these 

 diseases; some neutralize chemically the poisons formed by the 

 pathogenic bacteria (antitoxic action), others destroy the patho- 

 genic organisms (bacteriolytic action). They form the foundation 

 of the modern serum therapy or isotherapy. Recently, isotherapy 

 has developed in two different directions, which are to be dis- 

 tinguished as isotherapeutic and homoeotherapeutic principles 

 in the restricted sense. Isotherapy uses the so-called isobodies for 

 immunization, i.e., the same agent which causes the disease to 

 be combated: the bacteria themselves. It includes Jenner's 

 method of vaccination against smallpox, Pasteur's system of 

 anthrax vaccination, and von Behring's protective vaccination 

 against tuberculosis. Homceotherapy does not use the living or 

 killed organisms, but the toxins or antibodies produced by them, 

 and may therefore be called isotoxic therapy. To this division 

 belong von Behring's diphtheria serum, tuberculin and mallein, 

 tetanus, swine erysipelas and hog cholera serum, etc. For more 

 extensive details of serum therapy see the chapter on immunity 

 and vaccination. 



