THE  AMEEICAN 
JOURNAL  OF  PHARMACY 
A  COMPARISON  OF  THE  RESULTS  SECURED  BY  THE 
USE  OF  CHEMICAL  AND  PHYSIOLOGICAL  ASSAY 
METHODS  FOR  TINCTURE  OF  ACONITE. 
Authorities  are  not  in  full  accord  as  to  the  value  of  the  official 
assay  process  for  aconite  and  its  preparations.  Roth  1  states  that 
this  procedure  gives  no  index  of  the  activity  of  the  drug.  Ansel- 
mino  2  also  condemns  the  use  of  the  chemical  method,  and  calls  at- 
tention to  the  fact  that  the  German  Pharmacopoeia  no  longer  re- 
quires this  useless  performance.  Gane  and  Webster,3  Lyons,4  and 
Robinson  5  all  present  evidence  to  show  that  the  determination  of 
the  so-called  "  aconitine  "  is  no  measure  of  the  physiological  activity 
of  aconite  preparations.  Scoville,6  on  the  contrary,  believes  that 
the  method  is  not  devoid  of  value,  in  which  stand  he  is  supported 
by  Stevens.7 
Though  the  weight  of  recent  evidence  indicates  that  the  chemi- 
cal method  for  the  assay  of  aconite  is  far  from  being  strictly  ac- 
curate, the  fact  that  it  is  still  required  by  the  Pharmacopoeia  is  our 
excuse  for  endeavoring  to  secure  additional  evidence  as  to  the  de- 
gree of  concordance  in  the  results  obtained  by  the  use  of  the  chem- 
ical method  and  physiological  methods. 
For  our  experiments,  four  original  pint  bottles  of  tincture  of 
aconite  were  secured  through  a  local  jobber,  the  object  being  to 
obtain  samples  from  representative  manufacturers.  These  samples 
were  assayed  by  the  process  outlined  in  the  U.  S.  P.  VIII.  The 
following  results  were  obtained : 
DECEMBER,  1915 
By  Charles  C.  Haskell  and  H.  W.  Zirkle. 
Table  I. 
Preparation 
Tincture  A 
Tincture  B 
Tincture  C 
Tincture  D 
"Aconitine"  Content 
.04298 
.04183 
.04183 
.04093 
(537) 
