PEROXIDE  OF  HYDROGEN,  NEW  REMEDY  FOR  DIABETES.  409 
•PEROXIDE  OF  HYDROGEN,  THE  NEW  REMEDY  FOR 
DIABETES. 
By  C.  Gilbert  Wheeler,  Ph.  D. 
Within  the  last  few  months  several  notices  have  appeared  in 
the  medical  journals  of  Europe,  and  the  eastern  portion  of  our 
own  country,  with  regard  to  the  employment  of  peroxide  of  hy- 
drogen in  the  treatment  of  diabetic  patients.  Remarkable  suc- 
cess seems  to  have  accompanied  its  use  to  such  an  extent  as  to 
awaken  a  very  considerable  interest  among  medical  men  with 
regard  to  this  hitherto  little  known  compound.  At  the  recent 
annual  meeting  in  this  city  of  the  State  Medical  Association,  this 
remedy  was  brought  to  the  notice  of  that  body  by  Dr.  N.  S. 
Davis,  in  the  able  report  of  the  committee  on  drugs  and  medi- 
cines. This  report  will  be  found  in  the  Chicago  Medical  Exam- 
iner for  the  present  month. 
The  circumstance  then  of  its  coming  before  the  public,  as  thus 
stated,  and  likely  soon  to  be  an  article  not  unfrequently  pre- 
scribed, makes  it  appropriate  that  the  nature  and  properties  of 
the  substance  should  be  more  generally  and  fully  known,  espe- 
cially as  our  ordinary  text-books  on  chemistry  and  pharmacy 
contain  very  little  with  regard  to  it.  Although  peroxide  of  hy- 
drogen has  not  been  studied  by  chemists  as  fully  as  many  other 
compounds,  yet  much  is  to  be  met  with  in  chemical  journals, 
especially  those  of  Germany  and  France,  which  has  not  as  yet 
found  its  way  into  American  scientific  literature. 
Peroxide  of  hydrogen,  binoxide  or  deutoxide  of  hydrogen,  hy- 
dric  peroxide  and  oxygenated  water,  are  synonyms  for  a  com- 
pound of  two  atoms  of  hydrogen  with  two  of  oxygen,  or  of  two 
parts  by  weight  of  the  former  with  thirty-two  of  the  latter,  and 
having  the  formula,  Hg  Og ;  water  being  0,  or  the  formula 
H  O2  according  to  the  antiquated  dualistic  nomenclature.  It 
was  discovered  in  1818  by  Thenard,  an  eminent  French  chemist.* 
Has  never  been  prepared  direct  from  its  elements,  nor  obtained 
perfectly  pure,  but  always  in  an  aqueous  solution,  the  most  con- 
centrated having  a  specific  gravity  of  1*452.  According  to 
Schoenbein,  it  results  from  various  chemical  reactions,  but  soon 
spontaneously  decomposes.    It  is  formed  when  the  peroxides  of 
*  Annual  de  Chimie  et  Phys.    [2]  vol.  viii,  p.  306. 
