Omaha daily bee., 1919-02-03
The Nep Medicine.
Medical correspondent. london Times.

1t does not seem TO be generally understood
that during the last four years new medicine
has arisen in the world and effected tunda-
mental change in the whole attitude to disease.
AS this is matter of vital Importance, no
apology is needed for tracing the steps by which
the new medicine was evolved.
Some years ago disease was supposed gen
orally to be a fixed and certain thing like a
table or a chair. 1t was supposed to be as
easily differentiated as the larger mammals 1t
was supposed to be either acute or chronic, in
fictitious or noninfectious. durable or incurabe.
Doctors who failed to apply names to the NAL
aides of their patients were quickly brought to
book, because people held that every malady had
a name, just as every animal had name; and
the doctor who did not know a camel when he
saw. it-so to speak-was unskilled in his pro-
fession.
This was a very satisfying faith, because once
YOU had the name you could unlock all the
secrets. If the name was dyspepsia" for ex-
ample you comforted yourself that there was
no need to be alarmed unduly. You might
die but not for long time; not, in fact, until
you had taken bottles and bottles of medicine
"for your stomach's sake" If the name was
'lumbago," again there was good hope you
could visit spas and be happy, more or less. On
the other hand, if the name was "Bright's dis
ease" or "heart disease" things were bad in
deed. These diseases were VIGOROUSLY I'm
durable" and bottles of medicine could do little
to alleviate them.
1t was not only the public which held this
view; the medical profession held it also. Like
every view which has gained wide acceptance,
there was truth in it; and once upon a time
that truth had been living and active. Great
thinkers, Bright and Addison and others, seek
ing for explanations of disease in post norton
rooms had shown that in those who died in
a particular way particular changes were found
after death; and they had connected these
changes with the symptoms noted in the living
.ad hygtff nj
But that science, depending upon the facts OF
death to explain the facts of life, was bound
to be more or less of a transitory character.
The facts of life may be cast into relief by the
facts of death; they cannot thus be elucidated.
1t was we'll perhaps, for the doctor to be able
by means of one or other of group of tests
to declare that this organ or that organ was
definitely diseased. AS a general rule, however,
all he was saying was that for some reason
unexplained the organ had broken down in its
work and become the seat of 'hbrous change
Just as the feet become the seat of "hbrous
change" when corns grow upon them. Indeed,
the differences between corns on toes and corns
on heart valves or in kidneys and liver is merely
a difference of location From their more vital
seats "corns" cannot be dislodged.
The mischief was that this kind of medical
thought led to the vision of trees and not of
forests. The "hbrous change" was apt to be-
come in that conception the whole disease,
and not as it certainly is, one of the results
of the disease. Doctors thought in organs hearts
and livers and lungs when they should have
been thinking in great bodily changes due TO
assaults upon the whole organism. 1t was
necessary to remove the tight boots which
caused the corns, and not only to deal with
the corns themselves
Happily, new wind was blowing across the
dead bones The science of bacteriology had
come and it had been shown how, after infec-
tion with one germ or another, all these "fbrous
changes" which were called disease, could arise
The literature of tuberculosis was enormous be-
fore Koch discovered the tubercle bacillus; but
that literature dealt in organs and flbrous
changes. Since Koch these manifestations have
been relegated to a second place-their proper
place. And the same applies to syphilis AS
however, there were large groups Of diseases in
which no bacterial explanation of "fbrous
changes" was Immediately forthcoming The old
conceptions prevailed. Heart disease was still
looked upon as fact of life to be explained by
the facts of DEATH and so were kidney disease
and liver disease, and other conditions.
And then the war came and, suddenly life
triumphed over death. For the war revealed
young men with all the symptoms of heart dis
ease, kidney disease and so on. The symptoms
and the signs were present, but the "hbrous
change" had not appeared.
In other words, the idea that it was the
"fbrous change" and the fbrous change alone
which caused the signs and symptoms could no
longer be held. For here were the signs and
symptoms without any hbrous change. Sol |
dier's heart" trench nephritis," and the rest
of them sounded the death knell of ife-in-terms-
of-death explanations. The majority of these |
men, with the symptoms and signs Of advanced
and ncurable disease, made good recoveres-
or, in other words, regained their usual powers. |
So it was necessary to look for new ex- |
PLANTATION and to adopt a new conception. Hap
PLY, there was not, in some instances far to |
look Dysentery, trench fever, scarlet fever, |
diphtheria and other diseases were seen to be |
followed by heart troubles and other organ |
troubles with great regularity-it was no new
observation, but now it came with overwhelm- |
ing force. The conception clarified that these |
diseases of organs were due to the invasion of
the body by germs and that long long before |
the "hbrous change" occurred, the body was
engaged in a grim fight for life with resulting |
impairment of function.
The new medicine does not shake its head /
over the heart murmurs; it attempts TO find
the infection which is causing the trouble and
to eradicate it. The infection may be in the
teeth or throat or alimentary tract. The pioneer
researches of Sir Arbuthnot Lane have already
pointed the way in this direction. But there
are still weary miles to be traversed before the
nation as a whole awakes to the possibilities
presented. The shining truth that, if we can
prevent or stay infection, we can probably pre-
vent all the effects of infection-that is to say
the bulk of disease-has not yet been seen by all
When it is seen it will no longer be necessary
to conduct an AL empire on C-3 population.
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