Am.  Tour.  Pharm.  \ 
July,  19  iS.  > 
Zinc  Oxide. 
499 
the  neglect  of  materia  medica  and  drug-therapeutics  shown  oy 
many  of  the  medical  profession  in  recent  years. 
Drugs  have  positive  clinical  values,  and  these  should  be  as  ac- 
curately determined  as  possible  to  the  end  that  the  wheat  may  be 
separated  from  the  chaff  and  utilized  for  the  benefit  of  sick  human- 
ity. If  empirical  therapeutics  is  anathema  from  a  scientific  view- 
point why  not  develop  rational  therapeutics,  as  advocated  years  ago 
by  Dr.  Horatio  C.  Wood,  the  ablest  therapeutist  American  medi- 
cine has  ever  produced? 
The  old-fashioned  doctor  with  his  intimate  knowledge  of  the 
possibilities  and  limitations  of  drugs  in  the  treatment  of  disease  is 
being  superseded  by  the  new-fashioned  doctor  who  thinks  chiefly 
in  terms  of  preventive  medicine ;  and  unless  the  medical  profession 
awakens  to  the  very  serious  dangers  that  menace  it  through  its 
neglect  of  materia  medica  and  drug-therapeutics,  with  the  conse- 
quent insufficiency  of  clinical  results  and  the  weakened  confidence 
of  the  public,  the  influence  and  prestige  of  the  medical  profession 
will  be  seriously  imperilled. 
The  medical  profession  needs  nothing  today  so  much  as  to  be 
born  again  in  a  new  faith  in  the  rational  use  of  drugs  for  the  treat- 
ment of  disease,  both  to  ensure  and  promote  the  growth  and  de- 
velopment of  the  science  and  art  of  medicine  and  for  the  better 
preservation  of  the  health  and  lives  of  the  people. 
And  when  this  is  done,  then  the  old-fashioned  pharmacy  and  the 
old-fashioned  pharmacist  will  again  come  into  their  own.  God 
speed  the  day ! 
ZINC  OXIDE,  U.  S.  P. 
By  Charles  H.  La  Wall,  Ph.M. 
Under  the  title  "  Lead  in  Medicinal  Zinc  Oxide,"  I  contributed  a 
paper  to  the  meeting  of  the  New.  Jersey  State  Pharmaceutical  Asso- 
ciation in  1 91 7,  at  which  time  attention  was  directed  to  the  fact  that 
no  U.  S.  P.  zinc  oxide  was  obtainable  upon  the  market  and  that  the 
blame  lay  at  the  pharmacist's  door  for  not  refusing  to  accept  the 
articles  labeled  "  for  technical  use  "  supplied  on  orders  for  "  Zinc 
Oxide,  U.  S.  P."  and  for  not  demanding  an  article  in  compliance 
with  the  U.  S.  P.  requirements  as  regards  the  heavy  metal  test  es- 
pecially. 
