68 INTRODUCTION TO PHARMACOLOGY 



The alchemists (chemists) while searching for something that 

 would turn all metals into gold and cure all diseases proposed a num- 

 ber of remedies. They made extensive trials upon the well and sick, 

 and it is said that antimony was so named from is disastrous effects 

 upon the brother monks of the discoverer. 



Gunshot prescriptions were soon in vogue. They contained a 

 great number of remedies and were given in the hope that some of 

 them would benefit the patient. If he survived, credit was given the 

 medicine for a cure. If he died, it was attributed to the severity of 

 the disease. Those usages led to a state of nihilism, from which 

 Hahnemann developed the system of homeopathy and the rule Similia 

 similihus curantur. Symptoms alone were treated and little if any 

 attention was given to the disease itself. Hahnemann also believed 

 that by trituration, and dilution or shaking, medicine could be made 

 more powerful for good effect. While there were many fallacies in 

 this method, it proved of service to rational medicine, because it 

 demonstrated that disease tends to recover without the intervention of 

 drugs. One of the next steps in therapeutics was that of total free- 

 dom from drugs, which dates back to 1745. Skoda (1805-1881), one 

 of its strongest advocates, was the founder of the methods of auscul- 

 tation and percussion and really benefited the science which he 

 sought to destroy. 



With the isolation of the alkaloids (Morphine, 1817,) and animal 

 experimentation, the science of pharmacology, or action of drugs, 

 has developed and put medicine upon a more rational basis. 



METHODS OF TREATMENT 



The methods of treatment may be conveniently divided into ex- 

 pectant, specific, symptomatic, empirical and rational. 



Expectant therapeutics means the absence of any real treat- 

 ment beyond general principles of hygiene, rest and diet. This 

 form of treatment is often necessary when it is desired to let the 

 disease progress for diagnostic purposes or whenever nothing better 

 is knovm. If any medicine is given, it should be the aim to pre- 

 scribe something that will have a tendency to favorably influence the 

 disease, and not something that might possibly do harm. A placebo 

 is often prescribed for this purpose. The real object of a placebo 

 in veterinary medicine is to keep the ovsmer or attendant satisfied 

 that something is being done for the animal. 



Specific. Specific treatment directly attacks the disease or its 

 cause. In such eases treatment is determined as soon as a diagnosis 

 is made. (Salicylates in rheumatism, iodine in actinomycosis, etc.) 



Symptomatic. In this case the symptoms alone are treated, 

 without any regard as to their cause. Symptomatic treatment may 

 be indicated in some cases, but not in others. It may be possible 



