THE FIRST YEAR OF THE 
THERAPEUTICAL SOCIETY OF NEW YORK 
BY 
ANDREW H. SMITH, M. D. 
SECRETARY OF THE SOCIETY 
[REPRINTED FROM "ARCHIVES OF MEDICINE," FEBRUARY, 1879] 
' NEW YORK 
P. PUTNAM'S SONS 
182 fifth avenue 
1879 ABSTRACTS AND SUMMARIES. 
The First Year of the Therapeutical Society of New 
York. By Andrew H. Smith, M. D., Secretary of the Society. 
The Therapeutical Society of New York has recently com- 
pleted the first year of its existence, and a summary of the work 
accomplished may prove not uninteresting to the readers of the 
Archives. 
The fundamental idea in the organization of the Society was 
to concentrate the attention of the members upon definite thera- 
peutical questions given out in advance. These questions were 
to be tested practically by the members as opportunity offered, 
and when a sufficient number of observations had been accumu- 
lated they were to form the basis of a report to the Society. 
For greater convenience the work was divided among commit- 
tees, as follows : On Anti-pyretics ; on Neurotics ; on Restora- 
tives ; on Surgical Procedures and Appliances, including topical 
Medication ; on Electro-therapeutics ; and on Materia Medica. 
Each member is expected to elect one or more of these commit- 
tees with which he will serve. Observations are also solicited 
from persons who are not members of the Society, and a consid- 
erable number of such have been received. 
It is hoped that in the course of time the Society will become a 
centre toward which therapeutical observations from all parts of 
the country will tend, and where they will be assorted, classified 
and tabulated for publication. Suppose, for instance, a prac- 
titioner, perhaps in a distant State, obtains success in a single case 
with some agent not heretofore employed for that purpose. He 2 
ABSTRACTS AND SUMMARIES. 
may not consider the observation of sufficient importance to send 
to a journal for publication, but he transmits a brief sketch of it 
to this Society. It is referred to the appropriate committee, and 
at the next committee meeting it is discussed, and the mode of 
treatment is perhaps adopted as one of the topics for study by 
the committee. Observations accumulate more or less rapidly, 
until the committee are in possession of sufficient data to form 
the basis of a preliminary report. The publication of this elicits 
observations from a vastly widened circle of practitioners and the 
merits of the treatment are thus tested upon an extended scale. 
During the past year reports have been made by different com- 
mittees as follows : 
I. Report by the Committee on Anti-pyretics, Dr. A. 
Jacobi, Chairman ; a report on Pilocarpia. This report was 
based upon more than sixty carefully observed administrations of 
the drug, including several physiological experiments. The affec- 
tions for, or in which pilocarpia was given embraced simple 
catarrhal fever, muscular and articular rheumatism, lumbago, 
sciatica, acute bronchitis, chronic bronchitis and emphysema, 
phthisis pulmonum, onanism, ichthyosis, acute nephritis with acute 
pulmonary cedema, amyloid degeneration of kidneys, cirrhosis of 
liver, hydrops from mitral incompetency, empyema, convalescence 
from intermittent fever and from entero-colitis 
The conclusions reached are as follows : " Its principal laurels 
the subcutaneous administration of pilocarpium will reap in the 
desquamative nephritis of scarlatina, in the parenchymatous ne- 
phritis of diphtheria, and in acute and chronic nephritis generally. 
There is no doubt that a complete diaphoretic effect is, with rare 
exceptions, obtained with more regularity and rapidity by this 
than by any other diaphoretic, even the hot pack."* 
II. Report by the Committee on Neurotics, Dr. E. C. 
Seguin, Chairman, on the Use of Chloride of Potassium in Epilepsy ; 
also, Preliminary Report on the Use of a Mixture of Chloral and 
Bromide in Epilepsy The first of these effectually disposed 
of the hypothesis of Prof. Binz that it was the potassium of the 
KBr. and not the bromine that was the efficient agent against 
epilepsy, and that the chloride of potassium would be quite as 
efficacious as the bromide. The report was based upon a large 
number of observations made by Dr. Seguin at the Epileptic and 
Paralytic Hospital on Blackwell's Island. 
First of all, to determine the positive efficacy of the bromide, 
* For full Report see New Yotk Medical Journal, for February, 1878. ARCIHVES OF MFDICTN'B. 
3 
fourteen patients were selected to whom an inert placebo Was 
given for one or two months. The number of attacks which 
occurred during this period was compared with the number which 
took place during a like period while the potassium bromide was 
administered. The ratio was as 319 to 94. A comparison was 
then made between the attacks occurring in thirty-four patients for 
one month under the chloride with the number under bromide 
during a like period, with the result of 873 to 377. 
These figures show conclusively that the potassium is not the 
active agent in the bromide, and that chloride of potassium is not 
efficacious in the treatment of epilepsy. 
Preliminary report on the use of a mixture of Cloral and Bromides 
in Epilepsy. Twenty-eight cases were observed. The proportions 
cf the chloral to the bromide was generally one-half. The results 
seemed to show that the epileptic attacks were warded off quite as 
well by the mixture as by the bromides alone in equal doses, and 
that the bad effects of the bromides were materially lessened.* 
The Committee on Restoratives, Dr. A. Flint, Chairman, 
presented a preliminary report compiled by Dr. A. H. Smith, 
upon the Use of Ether with Cod-liver Oil, and also one upon the 
Use of Dcfibrmated Blood for Rectal Alimentation. 
The former of these topics was suggested by a paper read by 
Dr. Balthazar Foster before the British Med. Association in 1868, 
on the use of etherized cod-liver oil in phthisis, in which paper he 
refers to the discovery of Bernard that ether increases the secretion 
of the pancreas, and proposes its use with cod-liver oil to obviate 
the defective action of the pancreas usual in phthisis. 
The report covers thirty-one cases in which ether was given in 
connection with cod-liver oil. In twenty-six of these cases the 
comb'nation was well borne. Of these twenty-six cases it is noted 
in twenty-four that either pure oil or an emulsion of oil had been 
tried, and had disagreed. 
The ether was given tpz77z the oil in twenty-two cases ; after the 
oil-fifteen to thirty minutes-in nine cases. Of these nine cases, 
in three the patients had tried, unsuccessfully, to take the oil wz//z 
the ether, but exhibited perfect tolerance when the ether was 
given after the oil. About half a drachm of the spt. ether, sulph. 
was usually given at a dose. 
The second topic reported upon, "the Use of Defibrinatcd 
Blood for Rectal Alimentation " had been so short a time before 
the Committee that the material for a report was limited to two 
* For full report see JV. J'. Medical Journal for April, 1S7S. 4 
ABSTRACTS AND SUMMARIES. 
experiments and six cases. There were afterwards reported to 
the Committee nearly fifty additional cases, which will soon be 
made the basis of a report to the Society. From the aggregate 
of these observations, it appears that the treatment may often be 
extremely useful, not only in the class of cases in which chiefly 
rectal alimentation has heretofore been employed, viz., those in 
which alimentation by the stomach is nearly or quite suspended, 
but in a much wider range of cases, embracing all in which there 
is deficient nutrition from any cause which does not involve the 
rectum itself. Some of the results attained have been very re- 
markable. 
From 4 to 8 oz. may be administered at bedtime, and, if de- 
sirable, a like quantity after the morning evacuation. In most 
cases it is retained without difficulty, and it is frequently so com- 
pletely absorbed that the passages are not even stained with 
blood.* 
A second report by the Committee on Neurotics, also prelimi- 
nary, was on the subject of the use of Duquesnel's aconitia in- 
ternally in trigeminal neuralgia. 'Fen cases were observed, frem 
which the following conclusions were drawn : 
1. The susceptibility of individuals to Duquesnel's aconitia varies 
enormously, one patient having been severely affected by iAw of a 
grain, while another tolerated without any special symptoms -g\ 
every three hours. On an average, distinct physiological and thera- 
peutical effects ■wereobtained from tut of a grain three times aday. 
2. Out of six cases of severe trigemnial neuralgia, one, prob- 
ably reflex from a decayed tooth, was not at all benefited. Three 
cases epileptiform in form, were slightly or only temporarily re- 
lieved. Two cases were cured. One of these had existed for 
seven years, with an interruption of twenty months, procured by 
resection of the nerve. It would thus appear that in Duques- 
nel's aconitia, we must recognize one of the most powerful and 
best agents for relieving and curing trigeminal neuralgia. 
3. We do not as yet know the forms of trigeminal neuralgia 
most influenced by aconitia. f 
Besides the work here outlined, much has been done in com- 
mittees which will eventually be embodied in reports to the Society. 
Brief reports of observations upon any of the topics mentioned 
above, or upon other points of interest in therapeutics are so'.icited 
from members of the profession throughout the country ; such 
* For full report see N. Y. Med. Journal for July, 1878. 
f For full report see N. Y. Med. Journal for December, 1878. ARCHIVES OF MEDICINE. 
5 
contributions will be referred by the Secretary to the proper com- 
mit'ees, and if use is made of them in reports due credit will be 
givvD to the authors, and a copy of the report sent to them. 
Address Dr. Andrew H. Smith, iio East 38th Street, N. Y. 
City. -AERCHIAZYES OD MEDICINE 
A BI-MONTHLY JOURNAL 
Edited by Dr. E. C. Seguin, in conjunction with Thomas 
A. McBride, M. D., Lecturer on Symptomatology in the College of 
Physicians and Surgeons, New York, in charge of general medicine; 
Matthew D. Mann, M. D., Physician to the New York Dispensary, 
Class for Diseases of Women, in charge of Obstetrics, and Diseases of 
Women and Children ; and Lewis A. Stimson, M. D., Professor of Paiho 
logical Anatomy in the Medical Department of the University of New 
York, in charge of Surgery. 
The Archives oe Medicine is designed by the publishers to be in 
some respects a continuation of the "Archives of Scientific and Practical 
Medicine," formerly issued by them under the editorial charge of Dr. C. 
E. Brown-Sequard and Dr E. C. Seguin, and of the " American Clinical 
Lectures," edited by Dr. Seguin, of which the third volume, closing the 
series, was completed in December, 1878. 
The Archives of Medicine will for the present be published every 
two months; the first number being issued in February, 1879. 
Each number will be handsomely printed in large octavo form on heavy 
paper, and the articles will be liberally illustrated whenever their subjects 
render this desirable. 
The Archives will contain the following departments : 
1. Original articles, comprising essays, lectures, and short contributions 
of importance, to the extent of 60 or 70 pages. 
2. Editorial Department, which will consist of one or more analytical 
and critical reviews of some topics which at the time of writing seem to 
possess special interest. 
3. Reviews of books and descriptions of new instruments. 
4. Abstracts or translations of important contributions to medical 
science in foreign journals and societies ; and a summary of valuable 
society proceedings at home. 
5- A Case Record, comprising briefly recorded cases from Hospital and 
private practice, and from foreign periodicals, with short comments upon 
their meaning and value, and reference to similar cases. 
The Archives will not be a neutral or impersonal journal. The views 
of its Editorial staff upon topics of current interest and upon books will 
be expressed without favor or enmity, over the writers' initials or full 
names. 
COLLABORATORS. 
Early contributions have been arranged for from the following : 
Dr. W. T. Bull, A. Floyd Delafield, A. B., Drs. H. J. Garrigues, 
V. P. Gibney, W. R. Gillette, L. C. Gray, A. McL. Hamilton, 
Wm. A. Hammond, C. Heitzman, A. Jacobi, Mary Putnam Jacobi, 
E. L. Keyf.s, F. P. Kinnicutt, C. C. Lee, F. P. Munde, M. A. 
Pallen, Thomas R. Pooley, H. B. Sands, J. C. Shaw, A. J. C. 
Skene, E. C. Spitzka, R. W. Taylor, T. G. Thomas, Willjam H. 
VanBuren, Clinton Wagner, Robert Watts, R. F. Weir. 
The subscription price of the Archives will be $3.00 per year, and the 
price per separate number 60 cents. Specimen numbers will be sent on 
receipt of 25 cents. 
G. P. Putnam's Sons, Publishers, 182 Fifth Ave., N.Y. 
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