PNEirMONIA 249 



at. The six cases, some of them exceedingly severe, which 

 have been under my own care, have all recovered ; but in 

 the hands of others the treatment has met with- a more 

 variable success. Of twenty-three cases treated by Pane 

 with his own serum two died. One of the fatal cases was 

 injected for the first time a few hours before death, and the 

 other case was complicated with interstitial nephritis. 



Practical Disinfection. — The pneumococci have been found 

 in the dust of a room occupied by pneumonic patients 

 (Emmerich). In experiments by Bordoni Uffreduzzi 

 quoted by Sternberg, pneumonic sputum retained its 

 virulence when exposed on a cloth to direct sunlight for 

 twelve hours, and when exposed to diffused daylight only, 

 an exposure of eight weeks failed to kill the organisms ; 

 this resistance was probably due to the protection afforded 

 by the dried coating of albuminous matter. (It also seems 

 probable that the organism referred to must have been the 

 diplo-bacillus of Priedlander, seeing that the diplococcus of 

 Sternberg loses its vitality so readily.) 



Sternberg found that his diplococcus was killed by two 

 hours' exposure to a very weak solution of mercuric 

 chloride (1 in 20,000). This experiment was probably made 

 on a pure culture, not on pneumonic sputum. 



Patients should expectorate into a disinfectant solution, 

 while all soiled linen should be immediately disinfected. 



