﻿PRELIMINARY REPORT ON THE TREATMENT OF ENTAMCEBIASIS 



WITH IPECAC, EMETINE, AND NEOSALVARSAN AT THE 



PHILIPPINE GENERAL HOSPITAL, MANILA, P. I.^ 



By David G. Willets 



(From the Biological Laboratory, Bureau of Science, Manila, P. I.) 



With the cooperation of Court R. Stanley and Perpetuo Gutierrez 



(From the College of Medicine and Surgery, University of the Philippines, 

 and the Philippine General Hospital, Manila, P. I.) 



INTRODUCTION 



The brillant success of Rogers (i-5) and others (6-22) in the 

 treatment of entamoebic dysentery with hypodermic injections 

 of emetine led us to test the efficacy of this drug as compared 

 with that of ipecac in entamoebiasis. The work having been 

 interrupted for the present, it is deemed advisable to make a 

 preliminary report of the results obtained to date. Our series 

 of cases consists of 132. Of this number, 27 were dysenteric 

 and 105 were nondysenteric. Eleven of the dysenteric cases 

 were treated with emetine hydrochloride (prepared by Bur- 

 roughs, Wellcome and Company) ; 16, with ipecac. The non- 

 dysenteric cases were divided into 52 controls, 34 treated with 

 ipecac, and 19 treated with emetine. Among the controls there 

 were 8 cases of clinical syphilis with positive Wassermann re- 

 actions. The administration of neosalvarsan in these cases 

 seemed to have such a prompt action in freeing the intestine 

 of entamoebae that they are considered separately. 



Nondysenteric cases were included in our series partly be- 

 cause of the recent investigations of Walker (23) on experimental 

 entamoebic dysentery. He found that Entamoeba histolytica 

 is the essential etiologic agent of entamoebic dysentery; that 

 E. histolytica and E. coli can be differentiated in the encysted 

 stage by the experienced microscopist ; that carriers of E. histo- 

 lytica are common; and that the incubation period in his ex- 

 perimental cases varied from twenty to ninety-five days with an 



* Read before the Manila Medical Society, Dec. 1, 1913. 



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