Milford chronicle., 1926-10-29
DIR. DERRICKSON'S ADDRESS
BEFORE MEDICAL SOCIETY
Sees Man Left Prey To Slow
Diseases And Brain DeteriOra-
4 ton.

Members of the Delaware State
Medical Society and Guests:
To be permitted to speak to one
of the oldest and most progressive
societies of this country, and espec-
tally on the one hundred and thirty
Seventh anniversary is very great
privilege. l have memory of more
than twenty-seven years association
with this Society, and the honor OF
being elected your president, is
deeply appreciated.
We are living in the golden age
bf medicine. We have lived to see the
great scourges and plaques wiped
out. We have witnessed the era OF
athe discovery of the cause of most
of the infectious diseases. We no
longer have many thousands of peo-
4ple dying every year Of typhoid fever
its mortality rate has dropped 70 per
cent in the last year. tuberculosis
,has been so greatly reduced that the
mortality rate has decreased more
than so per cent. We have added
Aabout fifteen years to the span OF
life in the last few decades so that
now the average span Of life is fifty
five years of age, but still it is not
enongh. 1t appears particularly ap-
propriate l believe, to speak OF the
progress of medicine where for
many years the clinical divisions and
laboratories have worked together
for the greatest benefit Of the pa
tient and also for the advancement
of medical knowledge, that is for the
good of the future patient. We must
always realize the only purpose OF
medicine is to decrease human sut-
fering by preventing disease or cur
ing it. But this end cannot be reach-
ed except through a scientific under
standing of the functions of the or
ganisms when they are modified by
pathogenic factors. Today medicine
consists of an immense quantity OF
observations, partly empirical ana
partly classified according to sclen-
4 tific methods. Medicine is a science
IN the making. While the treatment
& of certain diseases, for instance, the
disturbance of the pancreas and the
typhoid glands is thoroughouly SCI
entific. the handling of others such
as mental diseases is still entirely
4 empirical. 1t is obvious that the
progress of medicine is bound to the
s development of the sciences con-
cerned with living matter and liy-
ing organisms. Physiology, which
was in it's infancy when physics and
E chemistry were widely developed,
cannot as yet supply to medicine IN
every part of it's field the 1ntorma-
ton necessary for the scientific stu
dy of it's problems. AS the physician
must help patients affected with all
kinds of diseases he cannot always
remain in the territory which has
been scientifically explored.
Therefore his task is very mucn
more difficult than that of the phys
iologist. who can select his problems
reduce it to it's simpler terms ana
solve it by techniques accurately
adopted to the subject of the exper-
iments. On the contrary the physl-
clan must wonder through the en-
fire field of medicine and meet with
diseases due to unknown causes and
developing within an organism of un-
known resistance. He is helped by
his scientific knowledge as far as II
goes but when he has reached It's
limit he has to guess. The past htty
wears have been a period OF triumph
for medicine because the revelation
nv Pasteur of the role of mlcroor-
eanisms in diseases has led TO the
creation of bacteriology and lmmu-
noIogy. The sciences have brought
about in a spectacular way the con-
nuest of infectious diseases a fact OF
momentous importance to humanity.
The death rate of the population OF
the civilized countries has been de-
creased by better hygiene and pro-
lection against cholera, plague, yel-
low fever, typhoid fever and tuper-
culosis.
Not only has preventive medicine
determined an increase in the quail
itv of human beings but has allow
cd nrofound modification in theiI
mode of living. People are crowded
into large cities and into factories
where they work as part of the ma
chine without danger of great cpl
denies and without imparing their
health. Immense armies when
heretofore would have been rapidly
reduced in size by infectious ols-
eases are kept in the field for years
without spontaneous losses. The ad-
,nirable work of Gorges in the Pan
anna has opened a new era in the MS
tory of mankind. Life in the tropical
climates has been rendered possible
for the white man. Who has thus ac-
ouired the power to dominate the
entire world, while the significance
of Pasteur's discoveries cannot be
forseen. it is certain that medicine
in protecting people from infectious
diseases. has already accomplished
miraculous progress. But we may
doubt whether this victory has so
far brought much happines to the
world. Has it greatly modified the
nosition of the average man as re-
cards disease and death. Probably
NOT. although the adult individual
has much fewer chances Of dying
from small pox, cholera, typhoid fe-
yer. and tuberculosis than fifty years
ago. but his expectations of reaching
the age of 80 has not markedly IN
creased. But he surely has more
prospects of being tortured by some
form of cancer, afflicted with slow
diseases of the kidneys, the circula-
tory apparatus, the endocrine glands
or becoming insane or making him
self miserable by his lack of judg-
ment. and his vices Modern medl-
cine-protects him against infections
which kill rapidly, but leaves him