Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
June,  1920. 
Editorial. 
361 
fully  to  prove  itself.  No  one  will  claim  that  the  present  scope  and 
content  of  the  U.  S.  P.  is  perfect  and  beyond  reproach.  A  certain 
amount  of  judicious  "pruning"  must  be  done  with  each  successive 
revision.  Even  the  ardent  conservatists  do  not  believe  in  keeping 
worthless  material  in  an  official  volume.  They  do,  however,  most 
emphatically  insist  that  until  there  is  proof  positive,  not  alone  by 
the  methods  of  experimental  pharmacology,  but  also  by  the  bed- 
side experience,  that  a  drug  is  worthless,  that  it  be  recognized  and 
standardized  as  are  those  of  more  evident  potency. 
"If  we  should  agree  to  limit  as  useful  drugs  and  preparations 
those  only  that  give  visible  results  in  the  pharmacological  laboratory, 
and  recognize  for  standardization  only  these,  I  am  convinced  we 
should  be  guilty  of  unfair  treatment  to  the  art  of  medical  practice. 
"Until  medicine  and  pharmacy  shall  become  more  exact  sciences 
than  they  are  to-day,  there  will  always  be  plenty  of  room  for  a  dif- 
ference of  opinion  as  to  what  is  valuable  and  what  is  not  among 
the  remedial  agents  which  are  now  recognized;  what  is  worthy  of 
recognition  in  the  United  States  Pharmacopoeia  and  National 
Formulary  and  what  shall  be  excluded  as  unworthy  of  such  recogni- 
tion from  these  volumes.  The  policy  of  admission  into  these  na- 
tional publications  has  been  very  largely  based  upon  what  is  gen- 
erally accepted  as  remedial  in  character  by  the  medical  profession 
as  a  whole;  not  by  the  few,  but  the  many,  who  find  occasion  for 
their  use.  What  is  thus  regarded  as  useful  by  the  many,  it  is  be- 
lieved, should  be  standardized  as  far  as  pharmaceutical  and  medical 
science  may  accomplish  this  end.  It  is  interesting  to  note  here  how 
doctors  disagree  as  to  what  is  and  what  is  not  useful.  A  prominent 
physician  made  to  me  the  significant  remark:  'As  long  as  clinical 
data  and  laboratory  findings  are  at  such  variance  it  is  unwise  to  be 
opinionated  on  the  point  of  drug  values.'  It  should  always  be 
borne  in  mind  that  U.  S.  P.  and  N.  F.  recognition  does  not  carry 
with  it  a  favorable  recommendation.  The  U.  S.  P.  and  N.  F.  are 
not  to  be  considered  as  treatises  on  therapeutics,  but  that  they  have 
the  same  relation  to  medicine  as  the  United  States  publications 
containing  certain  standards  for  foods  have  to  the  public.  What 
the  public  uses  as  foods  is  included  in  the  U.  S.  standard  for  them. 
It  must  be  admitted  that  a  certain  kind  of  prestige  is  given  to  a 
remedial  agent  when  it  is  admitted  into  either  the  U.  S.  P.  or  N.  F., 
but  if  one  mistakes  this  kind  of  prestige  for  a  recommendation  the 
fault  lies  with  one's  power  of  discrimination." 
