162  Advances  in  Pharmacy.  { AmkJa°rch  ^919*"* 
Idiosyncrasies  to  Drugs. — Civalleri  comments  on  the  fact  that 
the  term  medicinal  anaphylaxis  is  coming  to  be  used  instead  of  the 
old  term  idiosyncrasy.  He  discusses  the  literature,  on  the  subject, 
especially  that  in  which  quinine  is  involved.  Among  other  instances, 
he  makes  note  of  a  case  mentioned  by  Pereira  in  which  a  second  in- 
jection of  quinine,  given  fifteen  years  after  the  first  injection,  gave 
rise  to  a  train  of  grave  symptoms  that  could  only  be  explained  as  ana- 
phylactoid phenomena  in  a  previously  sensitized  individual.  Civalleri 
confirmed  this  experience  of  Pereira's  by  experiments  of  his  own 
on  guinea-pigs.  Serious  and  sometimes  fatal  phenomena  were  in- 
duced almost  constantly  by  parenteral  injections  of  quinine  in  previ- 
ously sensitized  animals  in  doses  which  normal  guinea-pigs  tolerated 
perfectly.  Effects  were  most  pronounced  with  intervals  of  from 
three  to  twenty  days.  The  smallest  sensitizing  dose,  by  the  peri- 
toneum, was  0.04  gram.  As  quinine  cannot  be  said  to  be  an  antigen, 
and  as  there  is  no  production  of  antibodies  with  it,  the  reaction 
cannot  be  called  a  true  anaphylaxis,  although  it  is  closely  analogous. 
Civalleri  would  describe  it  as  an  allergy  to  a  non-antigenic  sub- 
stance ;  he  says  that  it  may  be  acquired  or  congenital  or  inherited. 
— Rivista  Critica  di  Clinica  Medica,  Florence,  vol.  19,  191 8,  421. 
Preliminary  Report  of  Method  for  Estimating  in  Vivo  Germi- 
cidal Activity  of  Antiseptics. — With  the  idea  of  reducing  the  margin 
of  error  in  estimating  the  bacterial  contents  of  a  wound  with 
microbe  charts  Perkins  and  his  associates  have  been  culturing  the 
wounds,  counting  the  number  of  colonies  and  plotting  curves  as  in 
microbe  charts.  To  reduce  the  element  of  personal  equation  the 
work  has  been  done  by  one  man.  Inoculations  were  made  from  the 
same  part  of  the  surface  of  the  wound,  one  definite  spot  being 
selected  and  used  throughout ;  the  same  platinum  wire  loop  was 
used  each  time  in  an  endeavor  to  get  a  uniform  sized  drop.  The 
drop  obtained  was  inoculated  at  the  bed-side  in  2  mils  of  plain 
bouillon,  the  bouillon  suspension,  undiluted,  was  immediately  poured 
over  an  agar-agar  plate,  which  was  then  covered  and  turned  upside 
down  and  marked  with  the  patient's  number,  the  number  of  the 
culture,  and  the  time  the  culture  was  taken.  The  plate  was  then 
taken  to  the  laboratory  and  placed  in  an  incubator  and  kept  at  370  C. 
At  the  end  of  twenty-four  hours  the  colonies  were  counted,  macro- 
scopically,  and  recorded.  Carrying  out  this  procedure  during  dif- 
ferent stages  of  wound  treatment  with  antiseptics  some  idea  can  be 
