CHEMOTHERAPY IN BACTERIAL DISEASES 811 



Duhring's Disease (Dermatitis Herpetiformis), Scurvy, Chorea, Ma- 

 laria, Acanthosis Nigricans, Ulcus Tropicum, Variola, and Verruca Plana. 



In all these affections salvarsan has been found to exert a beneficial 

 and curative effect, either by direct action upon the microorganisms 

 present or as the result of the alterative and stimulating effect of the 

 arsenic. 



In Aleppo boil, leprosy, lupus vulgaris, tuberculosis, anemia, kera- 

 tosis follicularis, lichen planus, mycosis fungoides, pellagra, and pity- 

 riasis rubra, good or indifferent results have been reported. In 

 many conditions it would appear that salvarsan exerts a direct germi- 

 cidal effect, and in others the beneficial results appear to be dependent 

 upon a certain tonic, stimulating, and alterative effect of the arsenic. 

 In chancroid, scarlet fever, Hodgkin's disease, psoriasis, trichinosis, and 

 trypanosomiasis the drug does not appear to exercise any influence, 

 which is due probably, in the last-mentioned disease, to the fact that 

 trypanosomes are much more likely to become arsenic-fast than are the 

 spirochetes. 



CHEMOTHERAPY IN BACTERIAL DISEASES 



While studies in chemotherapy have been largely confined to the 

 protozoan infections, similar investigations are being made in bacterial 

 infections, especially in tuberculosis and the pyogenic disorders. 



As has previously been stated in Chapter XXIX, progress in this 

 direction has been made by Lamar in the treatment of pneumococcus 

 infections with mixtures of pneumococcus immune serum, sodium oleate, 

 and boric acid. Morgenroth has conducted similar researches in animal 

 infections with the pneumococcus, finding that whereas quinin, hydro- 

 quinin, and hydrochlorisoquinin have no effect on the pneumococcus, 

 ethyl hydrocuprein was capable of arresting the infection in 50 per cent, 

 of the animals when given six hours after inoculation, that is, at a time 

 when the animals were severely infected. 



It is to be hoped, therefore, that further researches will result in the 

 discovery of substances that have a marked bactericidal action and 

 that are yet but slightly, if at all, toxic for the body-cells, that is, sub- 

 stances in which bacteriotropism greatly exceeds organotropism. It 

 would appear that this discovery is possible and probable, but it can 

 be accomplished only as the result of persistent and prolonged research. 

 Probably the most wonderful discovery possible in medicine would be a 

 specific remedy for tuberculosis, and this may be within the realms of 

 chemotherapy. 



