Colon-Streptococcus Anti-serum. 



243 



106 (1853) 



The use of a colon-streptococcus anti-serum as a pre-operation 



measure. 



By JOHN WILLIAM DRAPER. 



[From the State Hospital, Trenton, N. J.] 



The work here presented is a part of the elaborate research 

 into the causation and treatment of the so-called functional psy- 

 choses, made at the State Hospital at Trenton, New Jersey, under 

 the direction of Dr. Henry A. Cotton. 



More than thirty years ago, while performing autopsies upon 

 the bodies of patients dying in the hospital for the insane at 

 Chicago, Dr. Albert J. Ochsner 1 noted that there was present 

 in an unusually large number very marked pathological changes 

 in the colon, and occasionally in the other viscera. He called 

 the attention of the authorities to these findings but was told that 

 even if present, these lesions had nothing whatever to do with 

 the psychosis, which was a personality or psychic disorder, entirely 

 separate and bearing no relation whatsoever to any physical 

 defects which might be present. In spite of his protestations this 

 opinion prevailed. Undoubtedly many other pathologists and 

 surgeons, both here and abroad, have noted the striking frequency 

 with which extensive pathological changes in the abdominal 

 portion of the alimentary canal and elsewhere are to be noted 

 among patients suffering with the so-called "functional" psy- 

 choses. 



Impressed with the very definite clinical improvements which 

 he had obtained by removing dental and tonsillar foci of infection 

 among these patients, and believing that there must be additional 

 sources for the very evident toxemia among those who made 

 little or no improvement after the removal of these oral infections, 

 Dr. Cotton invited me to conduct a surgical research which should 

 furnish evidence as to the presence or absence of such abdominal 

 infection. This work is now entering upon its fourth year. The 

 pathology is present and the favorable clinical results following 



1 Ochsner, Albert J., personal communication. 



