BACK TO HEALTH Is Diabetes Curable? 
How Those Afflicted with Diabetes and Bright’s 
Disease Can Be Helped to Restoration 
by the New Scientific 
SANBORN TREATMENT 
PUBLISHED BY 
THE SANBORN LABORATORIES 
Battle Creek, Michigan 
Non-Technical Edition. Copyright, 1923, by 
The Sanborn Laboratories DEDICATION 
To Dr. Ida M. Sanborn, who has lit 
the Lamp of Hope for thousands, 
has stimulated an understanding of 
Diabetes and Bright’s that may revo- 
lutionize our conception of these grim 
tools of Death, and completely change 
the present methods of treatment, this 
treatise is dedicated in grateful recogni- 
tion of her devoted work for humanity. CONTENTS 
Page 
Introduction . 5 
Chapter 
I.—The Menace of Diabetes 9 
II.—Bright’s Disease 18 
III. —Starving the Starved 21 
IV. —The Newer Knowledge 27 
V.—Treatment 37 
VI.—How the Sanborn Treatment Operates 40 
VII.—How the Patient May Hurry His Relief— 
A Little Chat with Dr. Sanborn 43 
VIII.—What to Eat 46 
IX.—“Acidosis” 51 
X.—Why the Sanborn Treatment Can be Ad- 
ministered Only by Trained Specialists 56 
XI.—A Human Interest Story 60 
XII.—Additional Evidence 64 
XIII. —How the Sanborn Treatment Can be Given 
with the Utmost Success by Mail 72 
XIV. —Why We Advertise 73 
XV.—Some Repetition—and a Few New Points. . .75 INTRODUCTION 
One in every five of the adult population of this country 
is afflicted with some well-defined abnormal condition in- 
volving the kidneys. This manifests itself in the'appearance 
of albumin, sugar or casts in the urine—or in dropsy, 
blood tension, or heart irregularity. So that at the present 
time perhaps the most dangerous menace to life and health 
in America lies in the prevalence of these insidious dis- 
orders, the presence of which is rarely even suspected until 
the body defense has been undermined, and the gnawing 
tooth of disease has eaten away the prop of life. 
Especially are these conditions to be dreaded after 
creeping age has slowed the powers of repair and retarded 
recuperation. 
Disheartening progress has been made in the treatment 
of these disorders. This is in part due to the failure of 
medical men to recognize their underlying causes— 
Until recently, it has been the general practice to attack 
the symptoms — rather than the thing the symptoms 
represent. 
In Diabetes, for instance, every effort is bent to keep the 
urine free from sugar—even the last bearable degree of 
starvation being employed for this purpose. This practice 
—protracted over any considerable time—so depletes the 
system that recovery is difficult, if not altogether impossible. 
It would, on the face of it, seem obvious that to deprive a 
diabetic of all sugar-forming foods is no more likely to cure 
him of a disease—one symptom of which is the appearance 
of sugar in the urine—than would depriving him of meat 
and all albuminous foods cure him of Bright’s Disease—one 
symptom of which is the appearance of albumin in the urine. 
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Bach to Health 
And, as a matter of fact, it rarely does. For the chief 
cause remains untouched in either instance. 
This failure to take the cause into account results in 
the death of thousands who succumb every year to these 
insidious disorders. 
The reason is plain. Physicians are taught in most 
medical schools that the only relief for Diabetes—usually 
pronounced incurable—is in rigorous and protracted diet, 
often lasting the remainder of the sufferer’s life, coupled 
in many cases with periods of actual starvation. This same 
teaching largely applies to Bright’s Disease. 
What the physician has been thus taught, he practices. 
His entire training and experience have to do with these 
methods. He is familiar with the symptoms and successive 
developments of his particular form of treatment, and 
therefore has some idea as to what to expect and what to 
do for the symptoms that develop during his treatment. 
Dr. Ida M. Sanborn, who perfected the system of diag- 
nosis and medication now employed solely by the Sanborn 
Laboratories, went through the same futile medical schooling. 
However, fortunately for thousands whose lives she has 
already saved, perhaps millions to come who may be 
restored to life and health through the means perfected 
through her intelligent and inspired effort, Dr. Sanborn 
was forced to take up a postgraduate course in medicine, 
in which she was both student and instructor. 
As a result of this intensive study and training, Dr. 
Sanborn has turned the old and generally accepted treat- 
ment of Diabetes and Bright’s Disease inside out and 
upside down. 
The food which other physicians fear to give she con- 
siders essential to relief, and to the restoration of normal 
functioning. The Sanborn Treatment 
7 
She claims, and she has proved her contention in thou- 
sands of cases, that nothing hut food—wholesome, nourish- 
ing, well-balanced food—can possibly rebuild a single cell 
of wasted tissue or restore a particle of lost strength or 
energy. 
Dr. Sanborn realizes that deprivation of certain food 
may tend to lessen the showing of sugar or albumin in the 
patient’s urine, but it does it only at the expense of the 
body tissues and vital resistance. And, meanwhile, the 
source of the disease remains untouched. 
For deprivation of food will stop the disease itself only 
when the deprivation is continued long enough to stop the 
person who has the disease. 
We use a lot more common sense and good judgment in 
dealing with a machine. If, for instance, the steam begins 
to fail in the engine, no sensible person would attempt to 
remedy the difficulty by cutting off the supply of fuel. 
Yet, this is exactly what many orthodox medical men do 
when attempting to cure Diabetes or Bright’s Disease. 
For you must remember that food is the fuel of the 
human engine. Nothing but food can possibly keep this 
complicated and delicate machine in operating condition. 
Even medicines are not food. The medicines combined 
by Dr. Sanborn with such rare judgment are designed to 
repair, but not to operate, the human engine. They merely 
help the treatment of these diseases in a more or less 
specific way, enabling the patient meanwhile to absorb and 
utilize the food necessary for his restoration. 
If the patient be not so depleted, by starvation or other- 
wise, as to have lost the power to digest, absorb and assimi- 
late the necessary food elements when given, arrest of the 
disease and restoration of health are confidently looked for. 
Many years of experience in hundreds of cases inspire this 
confidence. 
In these pages we shall try to make clear how and why 
this confidence has been developed; and why we believe 
this confidence is absolutely justified. 8 
Bach to Health 
We feel strongly that no more important message has 
ever been given to the millions who suffer from these dis- 
orders—not alone in America, but in the entire civilized 
world. 
The Sanborn Laboratories. CHAPTER I 
THE MENACE OF DIABETES 
Diabetes is one of the penalties inflicted upon us by 
what we are pleased to call “civilization.” The fortunate 
inhabitants of the South Sea belts and the aborigines of 
Australia or the Congo basin are blissfully ignorant of its 
ravages — another exemplification of the law of compen- 
sation. 
In 1917 there were 16.9 deaths from Diabetes per 
100,000 population; while 107.4 out of 100,000 died of 
Bright’s Disease. It is estimated that there are, at the 
present time, at least a million cases of Diabetes in this 
country. The number of nephritics is even greater. 
Dr. Eugene Lyman Fisk, of the Life Extension Institute, 
in discussing this matter, says: “Of course we have no 
morbidity statistics for the whole country, and can only 
estimate the morbidity from these troubles. It is easier to 
fix figures for Diabetes than so-called ‘Bright’s Disease,’ 
which varies in degree from slight, low-grade, chronic 
kidney changes to the acute forms. 
“However, from our own records, I am able to say that 
about 20 per cent of the active working population show 
definite signs of kidney irritation, such as albumin, casts, 
blood or low efficiency test. To these we would have to add 
those who are on the sick list, and who do not come under 
our observation. The fact of the matter is, the kidneys 
participate in the deterioration which affects all the tissues 
of the body as age advances. Hence my aversion to attempt 
any classification by specific diseases.” 
Statistically, it would sum up something as follows:— 
Diabetes— 1917 1901-1905 
Death-rate per 100,000 population... 16.9 11.5 
Nephritis or Bright’s Disease— 
Death-rate per 100,000 107.4 97.0 
From 1910 to the present time, however, owing to a 
broader conception of the factors entering into the develop- 
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ment of the disease, as well as to the adoption of more 
radical methods of dealing with it, this heavy mortality 
has been considerably lowered. 
THE STALKING SPECTER 
Yet Diabetes is in no sense a “modern disease;” for 
it is referred to in the Papyrus Ebers, that most hoary- 
headed of medical documents, recovered from the ancient 
Egyptian tomb. 
Celsus, the great Greek contemporary of Galen, speaks 
of the polyuria—the excessive urination—and the abnormal 
thirst of the disorder to which Arteus gave the name 
Diabetes—the Greek word for syphon. This, based on his 
belief that all liquids of the body were changed into urine 
by the disorder. 
However, according to the Ayur Veda (500 A. D.) the 
sugary nature of diabetic urine was known to Hindu 
physicians from the remotest times. Without doubt a de- 
scription of a disease characterized by “Honey Urine” 
refers to Diabetes Mellitus. 
It was not, however, until 1835 that the apothecary, 
Amboosian, conclusively demonstrated the presence of 
sugar in the urine. The work of Claude Bernard—published 
first in 1845 and 1850—gave for the first time a true con- 
ception of certain essential facts in the relation of the liver 
to sugar formation. These experiments pointed a path of 
investigation which is still being followed by physiologists 
and pathologists. 
TWO KINDS OF DIABETES 
There are two chief varieties of diabetes — Diabetes 
Insipidus and Diabetes Mellitus. 
Diabetes Insipidus is relatively a rare disease, occurring 
on an average of once in 10,000 hospital cases — which 
makes it only about one one-hundredth time as frequently 
met as is Diabetes Mellitus, or “Honey Urine.” The Sanborn Treatment 
11 
Diabetes Insipidus has thoroughly earned its name, 
“Syphon Disease,” for many sufferers from it have actually 
been known to drink from ten to twelve gallons of water 
a day—literally syphoning the water into the system, with, 
of course, a corresponding increase in urination. 
The specific gravity of the insipidus urine is low — 
1.000 to 1.005. Unlike Diabetes Mellitus, it contains 
neither albumin nor sugar. 
Often the health is only slightly impaired, although 
generally there is dryness of the skin, with progressive 
weakness and emaciation, as in Diabetes Mellitus. 
Nervous shock, the effect of blows or falls, pregnancy, 
syphilis, and possibly brain tumors or lesions, are supposed 
to be the most frequent causes for Diabetes Insipidus; 
although there is no reason for not believing that the toxic 
origin — the most probable cause of Diabetes Mellitus — 
should also account for Diabetes Insipidus. 
Insipidus is not necessarily fatal, although it is a most 
incapacitating disease. 
“HONEY URINE” 
Diabetes Mellitus, on the contrary, is a grave and — 
under present accepted methods—a generally fatal con- 
dition. Indeed, it is quite universally contended that a 
well-developed case of Mellitus in a child under twelve 
years of age probably never recovers. 
So great an authority as Dr. Nellis B. Foster, Assistant 
Professor of Medicine at Cornell University, has said: 
“With children and young adults, the progress and termi- 
nation of Diabetes may be seen definitely. The children 
all succumb within a comparatively short period after the 
disease is recognized; two years from the time of the first 
symptom is the longest tenure that has come to my observa- 
tion. I have known of no case of recovery.” 
In Diabetes Mellitus there is a hypersecretion of urine 
highly charged with sugar. The specific gravity of this 
urine varies from 1.020 to 1.040, or even higher; the per- 12 
Bach to Health 
centage of sugar from y2 to 10 per cent, or even more, 
although it is rarely indeed that this latter high percentage 
is reached. 
Diabetes Mellitus is found more frequently in the rich— 
who can afford to indulge their appetites—than in the poor, 
and is probably three times more frequently met with in 
men than in women. It is especially prevalent among 
Hebrews, and is only rarely found among negroes. 
ONSET SLOW 
The onset of Diabetes Mellitus is usually slow and in- 
sidious, and any one of its symptoms may appear first. 
As a rule, however, the earliest symptoms observed are 
unusual thirst and dryness of the mouth and throat and 
viscidity of the saliva. Polyuria (frequent urination) may 
either occur at the same time or be the first symptom noted, 
the daily output of urine varying from only a slight increase 
above normal to as much as twenty-five or thirty pints, and 
in some cases even more. 
Pruritis (intense itching) is a common symptom, particu- 
larly among women, and one that may cause considerable 
annoyance. 
The sufferer may sweat profusely under the influence 
of slight exertion or during moderately warm weather, or 
his skin may be dry and harsh. 
Bulimia (excessive appetite) is a common symptom, 
though the patient gains no weight or even loses flesh and 
grows progressively weaker. 
As the disease progresses, complications may be looked 
for. Neuritis is frequently observed. Gangrene may be 
readily produced by what under normal conditions would 
prove to be a trifling injury, an abrasion, a boil, etc. It is 
apt to begin in an extremity, especially the great toe, and 
extend upward. 
Gastro-intestinal disorders are frequently observed, con- 
sisting of indigestion, constipation or diarrhea. The Sanborn Treatment 
13 
In addition, he is often liable to successive crops of boils 
or carbuncles. Frequently he suffers intensely from itching, 
particularly of the genitals and in the anus; while eczema 
may at times manifest itself. 
Cataract is occasionally met with. The poisonous effect 
of the sugar-laden blood also induces loss of sexual desire 
and other manifestations of nerve exhaustion. 
Coma is the terminal symptom, most justly dreaded in 
the diabetic. It is caused by the accumulation in the system 
of poisons of a highly toxic nature—including acetone and 
diacetic acid—elaborated in the body of the diabetic by the 
disturbed process of metabolism. Coma is sometimes 
ushered in by cramp-like pains in the abdominal region, 
although often the only noticeable symptom of its presence 
is a drowsiness, gradually increasing, until profound coma 
develops. 
Then usually follow the convulsion—the last scene of all 
in this strange, eventful history. 
Brain lesions, degeneration of the “Islands of Langer- 
hans” in the “tail” of the pancreas; physical and mental 
overwork; overeating and obesity are believed to be the 
most common causes. 
Dr. F. A. Berry claims that about one-half of the cases 
of Diabetes are probably due to some pathology of the 
pancreas, most likely found in the Islands of Langerhans. 
The other 50 per cent is possibly due to one of several 
factors: a disturbance of the glycogenic function of the 
liver or some dysfunction of the suprarenals. 
Joslin especially stresses the influence of obesity in pro- 
ducing Diabetes and claims that 60 per cent of diabetic 
cases are the result of overeating. 
In a group of 457 patients, 38 ranging in age from 12 
to 24 years were 3 pounds overweight; 27 ranging from 
25 to 29 years were 54 pounds overweight; 72 ranging 
A FEW OF THE CAUSES OF DIABETES 14 
Bach to Health 
from 30 to 39 were 23 pounds overweight; while 320 
ranging from 39 years upward were on the average of 
37 pounds overweight. 
In a large proportion of cases, the trouble is brought 
on by the presence in the blood of an excess of the normal 
waste-products—toxins. The accumulation of these poisons 
is principally due to the ingestion of food in excess of the 
body’s needs. Overeating becomes more active as a cause 
of Diabetes when alcoholics are used. 
This accounts for the fact that Diabetes is often observed 
in vigorous subj ects who are large eaters, particularly those 
who partake freely or habitually of alcohol. 
All conditions that impose excessive strain, wear and tear 
upon the body, such as prolonged overexertion, mental or 
physical, worry, anger,—which are all attended by excessive 
production of waste-products,—favor the development of 
Diabetes. 
This is an extremely important matter, and one to which 
perhaps the majority of diabetics do not give sufficient 
attention — which is all the more deplorable, inasmuch as 
prevention lies very largely within the hands of these 
potential diabetic. 
DIABETES IN EVERY BOX 
To the fact that we are becoming a nation of “sugar 
hogs” may also be attributed a rather rapid increase in the 
number of cases of Diabetes in this country. For the eating 
of sugar in excess of the oxidizing capacity of the system is 
pernicious in the extreme. 
Our grandfathers and grandmothers, between 1800 and 
1810, consumed but 11 pounds of sugar a year. Between 
1910 and 1917 we had increased the consumption of sugar 
73 pounds! At the present time it is nearly 90 pounds. 
And heaven only knows how much farther it will go—with 
a candy shop on every corner in the country taking 
the place of the two saloons that formerly occupied these 
coigns of vantage. The Sanborn Treatment 
15 
Of course, it may well be contended that the lessened 
consumption of alcohol in these piping days of prohibition 
contributes somewhat to curtail the grand total of the 
number of diabetic cases. For your alcohol is a sure pro- 
voker of much more than “nose-painting, lechery and urine.” 
The underoxidation of the protein molecule, for which it 
was and is frequently responsible, must necessarily produce 
highly irritating toxins. It is the irritating effects of these 
toxins upon the protoplasm of the pancreatic cells that 
occasions the high incidence of Diabetes among drinkers— 
especially among those who drink beer to excess. 
YET ALCOHOL IS A WONDERFUL SOURCE OF 
ENERGY IN DIABETES 
And yet, when the diabetic is upon a drastically re- 
stricted diet, there is nothing in the whole pharmacopea or 
in the diet tables that can supply him the energy he gets 
in concentrated form in alcohol. 
This is because of the fact that alcohol is the only 
product that will yield heat and force without the expense 
of any digestive energy. For alcohol is immediately ab- 
sorbed and promptly utilized as heat and energy. 
Each gram of alcohol thus consumed yields seven large 
calories of heat and energy, which materially aid in con- 
verting fats and oxidizing fats and proteins, thus preventing 
the development of acetone and diacetic acid. 
WHY THE DIABETIC IS SO HUNGRY 
The body is a sugar-burning engine, running largely by 
the combustion of glucose derived from the ingestion of 
starch and sugar. 
All starch and sugar taken into the body must first be 
transformed into glucose, or dextrose, before it can be 
utilized to yield heat and energy. 
When, for some unknown reason, this glucose is lost to 
the system by being voided in the urine, actual starvation is 16 
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produced. The hungry tissues cry out day and night for 
their fuel food. This creates the abnormally large appetite 
(called “Bulimia”) present in most diabetics—especially 
in the early stages. 
Even though this appetite be catered to, however,—which 
it never is under the generally accepted form of treatment, 
—the patient progressively loses flesh. As the disease ad- 
vances, he becomes more and more emaciated, more and 
more weak and debilitated. For his diabetic process is 
robbing him of his only source of strength and energy—the 
tissue-building and energy-creating value of his food. 
The diabetic, as a result of lowered nutrition and defi- 
cient resistance, is subject to every conceivable disease that 
may develop. He is particularly susceptible to pulmonary 
tuberculosis and all infectious diseases, gout and rheu- 
matism. 
Albuminuria occurs in connection with a large number 
of cases of Diabetes—generally late in the disease. This 
form may be brought about by the excessive strain of 
elimination on the kidneys, although frequently the same 
degenerative process responsible for Diabetes is also re- 
sponsible for Bright’s Disease. 
SOME COMPLICATIONS 
A DIABETIC UNTIL DEATH 
It is interesting to note that most medical men regard 
a diabetic as incurable. Dr. Joslin, one of the greatest of 
all experts on Diabetes, says: “The treatment of a patient 
with Diabetes lasts through life. All too often in the recent 
years it has been felt that if the urine were rendered 
sugar-free by fasting, the treatment of the diabetic ended; 
in reality it has hardly begun.” 
“Treatment must, therefore, be adjusted to the condition 
of the patient, and should be so arranged that it can be 
continued for years, not only without harm, but with as The Sanborn Treatment 
17 
little annoyance and interference with the daily routine as 
possible.” 
HOW AUTHORITIES REGARD DRUGS 
Joslin says: “Drugs are not recommended by physicians 
like Professor Naunhyn, the Nestor of diabetic treatment, 
or by those concerned in the recent advance in diabetic 
treatment in this country. Drugs are not prescribed with 
the purpose of lowering the sugar in the urine in the most 
famous of our large hospitals.” 
This is the general concensus of opinion among medical 
men on this subject. Yet the astonishing results in the 
treatment developed by Dr. Ida M. Sanborn and her asso- 
ciates merely demonstrate how wrong medical men may be 
who still believe that therapeutic nihilism and a fatuous 
dependence on a semi-starvation diet are justified. CHAPTER II 
bright’s disease 
THE DIAGNOSIS IS THE EASIEST PART OF IT 
Nephritis, commonly called Bright’s Disease, is an in- 
flammation of the kidney, although not always of the same 
structure or part of the kidney, and may be either acute 
or chronic in form. That it is a serious disease no one who 
has it will deny. And that it is one of the most frequent 
causes for inefficiency, incapacity and death is evidenced 
by the fact that it affects probably 20 per cent of the 
working population in this country. 
With the acute varieties of Nephritis, we are not here 
concerned. Suffice it to say that they are dangerous because 
of their immediate consequences. Yet they are even more 
dangerous because they are likely to leave the kidney in a 
crippled condition, making it more susceptible to the 
chronic forms of the disease. 
A FEW OF THE CAUSES 
The causes of Nephritis are so many and varied that it 
is not always possible to determine the exact cause in a 
particular case. But that you may know what the common 
causes are and, knowing, be able to avoid them, thereby 
enhancing your chances for recovery, we will briefly give 
you some of the most frequent. 
a. Habitual overeating. This very common but dangerous 
habit results in burdening the system with waste-produets, 
thereby putting an overload on the kidneys that in time 
leads to irritation and congestion which may, under certain 
conditions, develop into Nephritis. 
b. The continuous use of alcoholic beverages over a 
considerable period of time. 
c. Infectious diseases — Scarlet Fever, Typhus Fever, 
Smallpox, Malaria—cause a large per cent of the cases of 
acute Nephritis, a great many of which, because of neglect 
or improper treatment, run into the chronic form. 
18 The Sanborn Treatment 
19 
d. Certain occupations seem to favor the development 
of Nephritis. Workers in lead and mercury are especially 
prone to diseases of the kidneys. 
It is also a well-known fact that engineers, firemen and 
others whose occupation subjects them to constant vibration 
and jars are particularly susceptible to Nephritis. 
Workers in cooling-rooms of packing-houses and others 
engaged in occupations that expose them to extremes in heat 
and cold are frequent victims of Nephritis. 
e. Pregnancy has long been recognized as a cause of 
Nephritis. 
f. Acute gastro-intestinal disorders appear to be the 
starting-point of Nephritis in many cases. 
g. Heredity plays a very important part in the develop- 
ment of kidney troubles. There can be no question that a 
tendency to Nephritis is frequently transmitted. 
h. Anxiety, worries and the high nervous tension incident 
to modern business activity favors the development of 
chronic Bright’s Disease, particularly where these causes 
are associated with overindulgence in rich foods, alcoholics, 
and sedentary habits. 
CHARACTERISTIC SYMPTOMS 
One of the chief reasons for the heavy mortality of 
Bright’s Disease is its slow, insidious onset, in which the 
symptoms are so seemingly trifling and unimportant that 
the sufferer fails to heed them until the disease is well 
advanced. If potential nephritics knew the “danger- 
signals” and would take immediate steps to combat the 
development of the disease at the first indication of trouble, 
the present mortality figures of Bright’s Disease would be 
tremendously reduced. 
A whole volume might be written on the value of the 
early detection of the signs of impaired renal function— 
the key-note of success in the treatment of Bright’s Disease 
is promptness. 20 
Bach to Health 
One of the early and most constant symptoms of Bright’s 
Disease is an increase in the quantity of urine passed, 
coupled with a frequent desire to urinate, not only during 
the day, but often two or three times through the night. 
This may be aggravated by the hyperacidity of the urine 
and by an irritability of the prostate gland, so often 
associated with kidney disease, particularly in those past 
middle life. 
Other symptoms are progressive weakness, often accom- 
panied by a gradual loss of flesh, disinclination to exertion, 
headaches, attacks of indigestion, a puffiness under the 
eyes, or swelling of the lower extremities and shortness 
of breath. 
Arteriosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries, is very 
frequently met with where Bright’s Disease is well defined, 
and, while not a symptom of the disease, is undoubtedly a 
phase of the same general process that causes the Bright’s. 
The association of Diabetes and Bright’s Disease is 
well known to most laymen, as well as to all physicians. 
The reasons for this association are perhaps not so well 
understood. 
We believe, however, that before the reader is more 
than halfway through these pages he will clearly see the 
relationship; for in the light of the newer knowledge of 
Diabetes and Bright’s Disease, much of hopefulness and 
helpfulness has been developed. CHAPTER III 
STARVING THE STARVED 
The whole philosophy of the accepted treatment of 
Diabetes is summed up in Question No. 20, which Joslin 
asks himself in his “Manual,” and which he himself answers 
with thorough assurance. 
The question is, “How can sugar be removed from the 
urine, or, in other words, how can the patient become 
sugar-free?” The answer is:— 
In mild cases, by eating less and exercising more, with a conse- 
quent loss in weight. In moderate cases, by still greater care in 
avoiding unnecessary food, and often by reducing the quantity 
of carbohydrates, protein and fat. In severe cases, by omitting 
the fat from the diet, by which procedure the danger of acid 
poisoning is prevented, and then reducing the carbohydrates and 
protein, or, in a few cases, by fasting. 
In these words Joslin admirably expresses the orthodox 
opinion on the subject of the treatment of Diabetes. 
It is quite generally believed that improvement takes 
place when the urine is kept free from sugar. For in 
Diabetes the physician knows that his patient is being 
poisoned by sugar (glucose), which for some reason his 
system is not utilizing, or taking care of, as Nature in- 
tended. “Disturbed Metabolism” he calls it. 
He knows that this sugar is manufactured in his 
patient’s digestive apparatus out of the food he eats, be- 
cause of some complicated pathological disturbance in the 
pancreas, or because of some nervous or mental influence 
which disturbs the normal physiological activities of the 
liver and the pancreas. 
Therefore, to stop the sugar poisoning he stops the food, 
so far as he dares, which, of course, tends to lessen the 
sugar manufacture, thereby satisfying the patient, for the 
moment, that he is getting better. 
But when he stops the food, other things stop as well. 
The patient’s strength and vitality and energy, and the 
restoration of his wasted tissues depend upon his food. 
21 22 
Bach to Health 
When the food stops, they stop. For wasted tissues are 
never restored with wind. 
THE HORSE DIES WHILE LEARNING TO DO 
WITHOUT OATS 
The physician is in a grave dilemma. If he starves the 
patient to reduce the urine-sugar, his patient loses his 
strength and weight and energy. It he doesn’t starve him, 
the sugar manufacture and poisoning go on all the faster, 
and the patient’s strength and weight and energy fall away 
the faster. 
The distracted doctor does not know how to solve the 
problem of permitting his patient to take the food his body 
needs and still avoid the sugar poisoning. He is in exactly 
the position of the gentleman who conceived the idea of 
educating his horse to do without oats. The horse’s educa- 
tion progressed beautifully—up to the point where he had 
almost learned to do without eating. And then the horse 
died. 
THE LOW DIET ALSO GENERALLY PRACTICED 
IN BRIGHT’S 
Also, in Bright’s Disease, whether it be chronic or acute 
in type, the physician knows in general that his patient’s 
kidneys are in process of degeneration — that actual 
particles of these structures and kidney cells are passing 
away in the urine. 
Some physicians think that meat is one of the chief 
contributing causes and therefore cut off meat. Some think 
that poisons, biological, chemical or mineral, which are 
disintegrating the kidneys, can be flushed out. These 
doctors advise great draughts of water, and the flushing 
out of the system. 
Others, on the contrary, say that a diseased organ should 
be kept at rest — as is done with a broken bone or an 
ulcerated stomach — and they therefore limit the intake of 
fluids, to rest the diseased kidneys. The Sanborn Treatment 
23 
There are various factors entering into the symptoma- 
tology which influence certain changes in the treatment. 
But, in the main, the generally accepted method is to 
starve the starved victims to the last limit of tolerance con- 
sistent with keeping the breath of life in their bodies. 
THE NE PLUS ULTRA OF SCIENTIFIC STARVATION 
Perhaps the utmost refinement of scientific starvation in 
Diabetes has been achieved in the now well-known Allen 
Treatment, originated by Dr. Frederick M. Allen, of 
Harvard and the Rockefeller Institute. This consists of 
putting the patient to bed, allowing him no food save 
whisky, black coffee and plenty of water. 
An ounce of whisky is given every hour from 7.00 a. m. 
until 7.00 p. m., together with bicarbonate of soda if there 
is any tendency toward acidosis present, as indicated by 
the strong acetone and diacetic acid reaction in the urine, 
or by the pronounced acetone odor of the breath. In most 
cases the precaution is not necessary, as there is no danger, 
so it is claimed, of producing coma by starvation. 
And so the patient is kept in bed and fasted until he is 
sugar-free. The disappearance of the sugar is rapid. If 
there has been five or six per cent of sugar, after twenty- 
four hours it declines to two or three per cent. And by the 
end of three or four days the patient may be absolutely 
sugar-free; for he hasn’t had anything out of which to 
make sugar except the material stored up in his own tissues. 
If he is obese, he may excrete sugar for a long time and 
still retain a considerable part of his weight, even though 
he is taking next to nothing in the way of carbohydrates. 
Indeed, it would seem to be quite clearly established 
that the obese patient’s digestive apparatus, having been 
overloaded with carbohydrates for many years, stores up 
the excess carbohydrates as fat, until finally the ability of 
the system to take care of the excess of carbohydrates be- 
comes lessened or impaired—and sugar appears in the urine. 24 
Bade to Health 
However, in the Allen Treatment, after the patient has 
been starved sugar-free, he is put on a diet of what is 
termed “5 per cent vegetables” — vegetables containing 
5 per cent carbohydrates, prepared by boiling the vegetables 
in three successive waters, so as to extract the free starch. 
Then the attempt is made gradually to increase the 
amount of tolerance for food of all varieties, so as to bring 
the patient up to a point where he can utilize, according to 
the measurement used by these doctors, 1,800 to 2,000 
calories per day. 
A COMPLETE CURE HARDLY TO BE HOPED FOR 
But even under the most favorable conditions, a cure of 
a diabetic is hardly ever even to be hoped for under this 
procedure. 
Joslin states the orthodox conviction in connection with 
this class of cases very clearly when he says:— 
The treatment of a patient with Diabetes lasts through life. 
All too often in recent years, it has been felt that if the urine 
were rendered sugar-free by fasting, the treatment of the diabetic 
ended; in reality, it has hardly begun. Treatment must therefore 
be adjusted to the condition of the patient, and should be so 
arranged that it can be continued for years, not only without 
harm, but with as little annoyance or interference with the daily 
routine as is possible. 
In other words, while with certain types of Diabetes the 
patient may hope to live for a time, in the majority of 
instances, as Joslin says, it is but rarely that he entirely 
recovers function. 
He may work up a fair carbohydrate tolerance; but he 
very seldom, if ever, is so completely restored as to be able 
to eat the foods and drink the drinks that a normal indi- 
vidual may eat or drink. 
And, understand, we are not here discussing any of 
those forms of Diabetes the origin of which is in the brain, 
that are incident to pregnancy, acute appendicitis, cancer 
of the liver or gall-stones. The Sanborn Treatment 
25 
WHY THE TISSUES DRY OUT 
The curtailment in the amount of carbohydrate food 
causes a progressive dehydration, or loss of the water from 
the system. 
There is some unknown factor in a rich carbohydrate 
diet that tends to cause a retention of water in the system— 
and with this a corresponding retention of normal weight. 
Some authorities contend that the consistent loss in 
weight, which is one of the most characteristic symptoms 
of Diabetes, is caused by the loss of the carbohydrate 
normally found in the body as glycogen. 
This, however, can have no foundation in fact, inasmuch 
as the total glycogen stored in the system amounts to only 
400 grams, and therefore the loss of even the entire amount 
would not materially affect the total weight. 
Both fat and the carbohydrates (sugars and starches) 
contain the same elements—hydrogen, oxygen and carbon. 
When these are consumed by oxidation, the resultant 
products are water and carbon-dioxide; neither of which 
can linger long in the system when it has once been jolted 
out of its combination. 
ONE MAY HAVE A SMALL AMOUNT OF SUGAR, BUT 
A LARGE AMOUNT OF DIABETES 
Many diabetics may have a relatively low amount of 
sugar in the urine, or be “sugar-free,” and yet be in a most 
dangerous condition as regards the possibility of their 
developing gangrene, acidosis, or even coma, when least 
expected. 
These are the cases in which the starvation treatment is 
practically negative of results. For, while it is relatively 
easy to fast an obese, high-living, high-sugared patient and 
get him to quit eliminating sugar in his urine,—for a while, 
at least,—it is quite another matter to starve a rather spare, 
low-sugared patient and get him to stop excreting sugar. 26 
Back to Health 
CATARRH AND DIGESTIVE TROUBLES 
HELPED BY FASTING 
Of course, it is obvious that starvation temporarily helps 
one important source of diabetic trouble—disorders of the 
gastro-intestinal tract. In this connection it must be con- 
ceded to be of undoubted value. So much so, that in many 
cases in which gastric catarrh is a prominent symptom, the 
clearing up of the catarrhal condition by appropriate treat- 
ment results in an improvement of the Diabetes. 
Funk, Dietrich and others have mentioned gastric and 
intestinal catarrh—colitis—and the beneficial influence of 
their correction upon certain cases of Diabetes in their 
practice. 
“HOW MUCH SUGAR CAN HE TAKE?” 
The chief problem considered by the average physician 
in the treatment of Diabetes is, “How much sugar can this 
particular patient utilize?” 
The answer to this query is important, since if an 
amount beyond the power of the system to utilize be taken, 
not only is this excess excreted through the kidneys, but 
the ability of the tissues to utilize sugar is progressively 
reduced and the system is poisoned by the excess. 
Because of this impaired function, the tissues are unable 
to utilize sugar as a source of energy, nor can it be 
stored as glycogen. 
Therefore, in a broad, general sense, diabetic treatment 
has for its object the regulation of the “warehousing” func- 
tion of the system for glycogen, together with a restoration 
of the ability of the system to metabolize sugars and 
starches. 
This is the effect sought for. And all methods, irrespec- 
tive of their theory of cause, or the philosophy upon which 
they may be founded, must necessarily fail if they do not 
accomplish this object. CHAPTER IV 
THE NEWER KNOWLEDGE 
In the second edition of his “Diabetic Manual,” Dr. 
Joslin has a chapter eighty-seven words long. It is entitled 
“Drugs in the Prevention of Diabetes.” 
The first fifty words of the chapter state that “drugs are 
not recommended by physicians like Professor Naunhyn, 
the Nestor of diabetic treatment, or by those concerned in 
the recent advance in diabetic treatment in this country. 
Drugs are not prescribed with the purpose of lowering 
the sugar in the urine in the most famous of our large 
hospitals.” 
Dr. Nellis B. Foster, in his book on “Diabetes Mellitus,” 
writes more than ten thousand words on “treatment,” but 
without one solitary reference to medication, other than a 
brief reference to neutralizing or lessening acidosis. Also, 
a eulogy of the value of alcohol, which, by the way, is 
thoroughly justified. 
His “medication” consists in cutting the carbohydrate 
to the vanishing-point, and not infrequently abbreviating 
even the protein intake to the last bearable degree 
Dr. Allen’s book and articles, as well as the writings of 
Woodyatt, Sansum and other authorities, are equally illumi- 
nating in what they fail to say about the value of medicine 
in Diabetes and Bright’s. 
In fact, orthodox medical men, convinced in their own 
minds of the utter uselessness of any medication in these 
disorders, are quite in accord with the spirit of therapeutic 
nihilism, which has stolen out of the German and Austrian 
universities and saturated the medical mind of the entire 
world. 
So they give little, if any, medicine in cases of Diabetes 
and Bright’s. If they give any, it is usually more for the 
mental effect than for any expected therapeutic value. 
Their nihilistic views, however, are thoroughly justified 
from the standpoint of their conception of the etiology, or 
cause, of the trouble. 
27 Back to Health 
28 
THE CAUSE OF THE CAUSE 
This cause, according to Dr. William H. Porter, Emeri- 
tus Professor of Pathology and Clinical Medicine in the 
Postgraduate Medical School and Hospital, New York, 
is underoxidation and imperfect elimination of the end- 
products of digestion. In other words, the incomplete 
conversion and abnormal retention of products formed by 
putrefactive fermentation in the intestinal canal. 
In discussing this question in his eminently practical 
book, “Eating to Live Long,” Dr. Porter says:— 
“The problem is to prevent the excessive formation of 
uric acid and such putrefactive toxic products as cause 
chronic irritation of the kidney structure. 
“Incomplete oxidation of the proteins frequently results 
in either the uric acid or the diabetic conditions, largely 
because of an excess of sugars, starches or fats in the diet. 
Much more oxygen is utilized to oxidize, or convert the 
protein molecule into its end-products. On the other hand, 
the molecule of starch, sugar or fat requires far less oxygen 
for its complete reduction and the formation of end- 
products, but it is oxidized so rapidly and in such large 
numbers that there is not enough oxygen available to 
satisfy a molecule of protein parentage. 
“Perhaps a slightly greater restriction in the use of 
starches may be required in the initial stages of the treat- 
ment of Diabetes; but, in a general way, what is effective 
in reducing the underoxidation in Nephritis is equally effec- 
tive in Diabetes, gout, rheumatism, high blood-pressure, 
arteriosclerosis, intestinal indigestion, senility, and even in 
anemia, tuberculosis and other degenerative disorders.” 
Again, Dr. Porter says: “Because glycogen occasionally 
has been found in the liver, it has been looked upon as a 
‘stored-up’ product. Much, if not all, of the glycogen pro- 
duced in the system, however, is derived from oxidation 
reduction of the nitrogenous products—from the albumin. 
When oxidation is incomplete, it passes as glycogen, or The Sanborn Treatment 
29 
some other form of antecedent product, to the kidneys, 
where it is seized by the kidney cells and discharged in the 
urine, giving rise to the condition known as glycosuria, or 
Diabetes.” 
BARKING UP THE WRONG TREE 
If it be true that the real factor in the development of 
Diabetes is the underoxidation of the protein molecule, and 
that if there are degenerative changes in the liver or the 
pancreas, these usually develop as a result of poisoning 
by the products of underoxidation, and not because of an 
intrinsic deficiency or disease in these organs themselves, 
our entire philosophy of sugar tolerance may be founded 
upon a misconception. And our attempt to cure Diabetes 
by withholding easily converted starches, or already con- 
verted sugar, is a terrible mistake, as it inevitably tends to 
lower the oxidizing power of the system in the oxidation 
reduction of the protein molecule, as well as to further 
deplete the system already sadly deficient in stores of 
energy. 
If, as Professor Porter says, the free-burning sugar is 
the kindling that oxidizes the fat, and the free oxidation 
of fat yields heat and energy to normally transform the 
end-products of protein digestion, it is obvious that we have 
been working on an erroneous foundation in altogether with- 
holding the kindling that would tend completely to consume 
these poisonous end-products of albumin metabolism. 
And, it is more than likely that Diabetes may be the 
“expression of resentment on the part of liver or pancreas 
against overwork—in the frequent result of the absorption 
of toxins that paralyze the normal functioning of the 
gland.” 
IN SUPPORT OF THE NEWER KNOWLEDGE 
This theory is gradually gaining ground among modern 
authorities. It is the piece de resistance of Philip Horowitz’s 30 
Back to Health 
book. In fact, Dr. Horowitz plainly states his belief that 
“Diabetes and other forms of metabolic disturbances, such 
as nephritis, arteriosclerosis, gout, etc., are the results of an 
autointoxication causing an interference with the function 
of the ductless glands, or irritation of these and other 
organs.” 
Dr. Thomas W. Edgar (“Patient’s Handbook on the 
Treatment of Diabetes Mellitus”) also gives autointoxica- 
tion a large share of credit — or blame — for causing 
Diabetes. 
It cannot be denied that treatment based on this pathol- 
ogy, directed toward the correction of all fermentative 
conditions in the small intestines,—as determined by the 
elimination of indican from the urine,—is most vital. 
THE FOCUS OF A STELLAR FACT IN SCIENCE 
It is, no doubt, in strict conformity with these advanced 
theories that the astonishing results secured by Dr. Ida M. 
Sanborn are brought about. 
In fact, it is of intense scientific interest, as well as to 
the interest of every person afflicted with Diabetes or 
Bright’s, to note that independently of each other, Dr. 
Porter and Dr. Sanborn had for twenty years past been 
evolving what must now be recognized as the ultra-modern 
conception of the etiology, or cause, and the treatment of 
underoxidation disorders—a conception to which many of 
the most eminent physiologists and clinicians in this country 
and in Europe are now, as we have seen by the references 
noted above, definitely committed. 
Dr. Sanborn has had, for upward of a score of years, 
an astonishing degree of success in clearing up all evidence 
of Diabetes and Bright’s Disease in patients of all ages, 
many of whom were in well-advanced stages of the dis- 
orders. 
A large percentage of these patients were afflicted with 
both Diabetes and Bright’s Disease; the diagnosis estab- The Sanborn Treatment 
31 
lished beyond a question, and confirmed by the observation 
of some of the ablest men in the country, under whose care 
not an inconsiderable number of these patients had origi- 
nally run the gamut of all the accredited forms of treatment 
now in general use. 
Now, if a patient, after any course of treatment, so 
improves that all sugar, acetone, diacetic acid, albumin and 
casts clear up, and if he remains in this normal condition 
for a number of years, he may truly be said to have been 
cured of his disease. 
If, in addition, application for heavy life insurance by 
this patient is favorably passed upon, it would tend to 
confirm the conviction that all discoverable symptoms of 
any abnormal condition must have been removed. 
For these conditions, as may be again emphasized, are 
not mental or subjective — as in neurasthenia, where the 
patient’s symptoms may fluctuate with every breeze that 
blows across the mazes of the mind. On the contrary, they 
are capable of being accurately checked in any laboratory 
properly equipped to make the necessary urinary tests. 
FOOD IS GOOD MEDICINE IF IT CAN BE UTILIZED 
The orthodox method of rigorously restricting the diet 
in the treatment of Diabetes is about as sound as to expect 
an engine to continue to run without fuel. 
If you put no fuel in the furnace there will be no ashes 
(refuse—waste material), but neither will there be any fire. 
And so it is with the human body. If you withhold all 
sugar-forming foods, no sugar (ash) will be eliminated; 
in fact, the urine may be made sugar-free by starvation— 
but the disease remains. And because of the weakening 
effect of the withdrawal of all heat- and energy-producing 
foods, the sufferer is reduced to a weakened, emaciated, 
helpless condition, and is an easy prey to coma or any of 
the infectious or wasting diseases that are ever present and 
waiting a favorable opportunity to strike. 32 
Bach to Health 
A form of diet calculated to turn Jack Dempsey or 
Vladek Zbyszko into a pale-faced invalid most emphatically 
could not be depended upon to restore robust strength and 
the hue of health to those whose feet are stumbling down 
the steep slopes that lead into the Valley of the Shadow. 
This is why Dr. Sanborn and the physicians of the 
Sanborn Laboratories prescribe nourishing and well- 
balanced food for diabetics and nephritics, such as a normal 
person of like weight and activities ought to have. 
Of course, many patients who write or send for treat- 
ment have been so reduced by starvation and their disease 
that it is often necessary to build up the diet for them by 
gradual stages. Sometimes it has been found necessary to 
begin with an entirely liquid diet. 
However, the Staff, guided by a careful and scientific 
examination of the urine in each case, prescribe the food 
best adapted to the patient’s existing condition, and change 
the kind, variety and amount as rapidly as the progress 
of the case warrants. 
MEAT IN DIABETES AND BRIGHT’S 
Dr. Sanborn and the physicians of the Sanborn Labora- 
tories believe that all varieties of food are important; but 
the proteins are the most important, not only for the work 
they accomplish, but also for the potentialities for harm 
that are wrapped up in them if their debris—their organic 
ashes and clinkers—are not removed from the alimentary 
firebox after their parent forms have “done their bit.” 
For the proteins are the undisputed champions of the 
body’s poison squad. This does not mean that they should 
be eliminated, but only that they should be thoroughly 
digested. And the most certain way to insure their proper 
digestion is to take them in their most digestible form— 
meat (preferably beef), eggs and milk. 
Only 2.8 per cent of beef is lost in its passage through 
the alimentary canal; 2.9 per cent of eggs, and 5.7 per cent 
of milk; as against 80 per cent of the protein of oats, for The Sanborn Treatment 
33 
instance, which passes undigested through the alimentary 
tube of the sturdy Scot. The same ease of digestion holds 
true for animal foods generally, but the three here men- 
tioned are the best for practical utility. 
WHY THE STEER HAS 200 FEET OF INTESTINES 
Of course, protein can be extracted from vegetable foods. 
But do not forget that God gave the steer 200 feet of 
intestines, so that he could break up vegetable protein, and 
make it easier for human consumption in meat form. 
Which is a mighty good excuse for recommending a 
well-balanced diet, with meat as the piece de resistance. 
THE CALORY FAD 
One fact that must establish Dr. Sanborn and her asso- 
ciates as advanced medical thinkers is their repudiation of 
the calory as a measure of food value. 
They believe, with Dr. Porter, that food which is oxi- 
dized, or consumed, in the body, is burned by chemical 
action—which is an entirely different thing from combus- 
tion, the combustion that takes place in a furnace, or a 
calorimeter bomb, and is the basis of calory measurement. 
On the basis of these measurements, fat, for instance, 
yields approximately twice as much heat as the sugars or 
starches, or even protein. In fact, weight for weight, fats 
have a much higher caloric value than any other type of 
food. Yet, who would be obtuse enough to believe that a 
fine calory-filled diet of fat would be best adapted to supply 
all the requirements of growth and nutrition? 
CALORIES CAN’T BUILD TISSUE, MAKE BLOOD, OR 
CONSTRUCT BONE 
Calory scientists lose sight of the fact that a considerable 
part of the heat which results from the oxidation of food 
in the body goes to maintain normal temperature, and that 34 
Bach to Health 
where the oxidation processes are impaired by disease or 
faulty nutrition, no amount of calory value can be de- 
pended upon for this purpose. 
Nor can calories, no matter how numerous, put iron into 
an anemic blood corpuscle, nor increase the amount of 
manganese in the coloring matter of the blood. 
Foods which have the very highest percentage of calories 
are absolutely worthless for building fluorides around the 
tooth structure, or for feeding calcium and phosphorus 
into the bones. 
Calories have nothing to do with maintaining the normal 
alkalinity of the blood, and preventing acidosis; or supply- 
ing the body with magnesia, sodium, sulphur, potassium, or 
other mineral salts and colloids, which are indispensable in 
the control of the various intricate metabolic processes 
of the body. 
In short, the scientists and dietitians who have become 
devotees in the worship of the great god Calory have 
entirely lost sight of the fact that the food requirements 
of the body, as expressed in the actual chemical needs of 
the organism, and the fuel, or energy requirements, as 
expressed in the terms of calories, have no more to do with 
one another than have ships, soup-tureens and mad hatters. 
It is interesting to note that Dr. Sanborn has, for twenty 
years, advocated what Dr. Allen now consistently recom- 
mends—a reasonable amount of exercise for all diabetic 
patients able to take exercise. 
Fat is reduced and muscle tissues are built up by exer- 
cise. But, most of all, respiration is deepened, oxygenation 
is increased, and oxidation-reduction enhanced by the 
influence of exercise. 
Also, it may be interesting to know that Dr. Sanborn 
has found that where it is necessary to restrict temporarily 
to a starch-free diet, the ordinary gluten breads so gener- 
ally used are, if anything, worse than white bread itself. 
EXERCISE IN MODERATION A SPLENDID THING The Sanborn Treatment 
35 
This experience of many years is borne out by the anal- 
ysis of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, 
which has proved that many gluten flours, recommended 
to diabetics in the fatuous belief that the products are 
starch-free, contain anywhere from 4 or 5 to 78 per cent 
of starch. 
When starch is temporarily contraindicated, it may be 
just as well for the physician therefore to assure himself 
that it is not present in the flour he recommends. 
SOMETIMES WELL NOT TO PAY EXAGGERATED 
ATTENTION TO SMALL AMOUNTS OF SUGAR 
The presence of a small amount of sugar in the urine is 
of little moment, provided active elimination of the toxins 
is kept up, and does not call for “meddling” with the diet. 
First, because the accurate weighing of each mouthful is 
somewhat of a hardship, and, secondly, because the capacity 
for completely oxidizing a given quantity of nutriment 
is not always the same. 
Again, much may depend upon the ability and the oppor- 
tunity for taking exercises, which, of course, would hasten 
the oxidizing process. 
Also, it would be well to emphasize that articles of food 
which may well be tolerated at one time totally disagree 
at another, and vice versa. 
This is one of the reasons why the patient who thor- 
oughly understands and intelligently applies the instruc- 
tions given from time to time may do much better than a 
patient whose pathology is not nearly so grave, but who, 
because of that very fact, is less faithful to the treatment. 
THE VALUE OF ELIMINATION 
While the most scrupulous attention should be given to 
insure thorough elimination, and to prevent the accumu- 
lation of poisons within the system, all drastic purgatives 36 
Back to Health 
are usually to be avoided, as they tend to deplete a system 
already low in vital resistance. 
The tendency toward acidity also is reduced by the use 
of soda bicarbonate, or else by the free use of one of the 
alkaline waters, which tends to alkalinize the blood, and 
yet is followed by no disagreeable reaction on the hydro- 
chloric acid-secreting action of the stomach. CHAPTER V 
TREATMENT 
We come now to the part of our subject which is nearest 
the heart of every sufferer—the remedy. 
If you have read the preceding pages attentively, you 
have seen that the Sanborn Treatment is directed at what 
wTe believe to be the underlying cause—the body’s impaired 
power to utilize sugar—rather than at the result of that 
condition—sugar in the urine. 
We know that if we artificially reduce the sugar in the 
urine by starvation—or drugs, and there are drugs that 
act very powerfully in this- direction—we have by no means 
removed the disease. We have only done away with one of 
the symptoms—muffled the danger-signal, as it were, and 
actually left our patient in a more dangerous condition 
than before. We now have nothing to guide us as to what is 
going on internally. We are working in the dark and 
cannot tell as to the progress of the disease. 
While we do not claim to know all there is to know 
about Diabetes or Bright’s Disease or to be able to relieve 
every case, we honestly believe that we have the safest and 
most reliable treatment for these deadly maladies that is 
known today. We restore every year hundreds upon hun- 
dreds of sufferers whose cases had absolutely refused to 
yield to every other treatment that had been tried, and no 
sufferer should give up in despair before giving the Sanborn 
Treatment a trial. 
Some of our cases elude us in spite of all we can do, but 
these are few. Generally speaking, they are cases of the 
most malignant type and of long standing, where the poisons 
resulting from the faulty metabolism have set up serious 
complications which are quite as hard to combat as the 
original disease. And in many cases we have to fight 
almost as hard to overcome the effects of the “treatments” 
previously undergone as we do to combat the disease itself. 
37 38 
Back to Health 
HOW THE SANBORN TREATMENT WAS DISCOVERED 
Twenty-five years ago, Dr. Sanborn—then a surgeon of 
promise—was told that her father had Diabetes and that 
medical skill could do nothing more for him. 
Faced with this verdict, Dr. Sanborn consecrated herself 
to the saving of her father’s life. 
She found that little was known of the disease beyond 
the fact that the examination of the urine showed sugar, 
and that the recognized form of treatment was to deprive 
the patient of all sugars and starches in the hope of some- 
what retarding the progress of the disease. 
Almost always, however, it was found that the patient 
got worse instead of better—that depriving the system of 
the foods it required for the maintenance of health and 
strength was a serious injury rather than an aid. 
Dr. Sanborn started where other physicians left off. 
She equipped her home with a complete laboratory for the 
study of Diabetes. She labored day and night, giving her 
whole energy toward the saving of her father’s life. 
And she was successful. Her father was completely 
restored to health and strength. He lived more than twenty 
years afterward and died not long ago of pneumonia at 
the ripe age of eighty-seven. 
From her intensive laboratory work which led to the 
mastery of her father’s case, Dr. Sanborn discovered that 
many tests besides the ones for sugar were necessary in 
order to determine the progress of the disease. Sometimes 
these tests of a single specimen were carried on for days 
before a positive diagnosis was made. 
When these tests were completed, then and only then 
could an intelligent treatment be given. The Doctor’s find- 
ings enabled her to treat the cause of the disease rather 
than the results of that cause. 
Therefore, in order to derive the full benefit from the 
Sanborn Treatment for either Diabetes or Bright’s Disease, 
it is first necessary to make a careful urinalysis in order to The Sanborn Treatment 
39 
discover the exact stage of the disease and govern the 
treatment and the diet accordingly. 
This urinalysis is made by trained chemists of long 
experience in laboratories equipped for this particular type 
of work. All research work is under the direction of 
thoroughly trained and competent chemists and laboratory 
technicians. 
And it is to the thoroughness and completeness of these 
urinalyses that the Sanborn Treatment owes much of its 
wonderful success. CHAPTER VI 
HOW THE SANBORN TREATMENT OPERATES 
We are often asked, “How does the Sanborn Treatment 
act?”, “How can it be so effective when the orthodox 
treatment for Diabetes and Bright’s Disease is so un- 
satisfactory ?” 
While the underlying cause of Diabetes and Bright’s 
Disease is still not definitely known, it is the contention of 
Dr. Sanborn, as stated in a preceding chapter, that both of 
these diseases—quite generally held to be incurable—are 
the result of underoxidation of the end-products of diges- 
tion—a contention supported by Professor Porter. 
If the waste materials incident to the processes of life 
are not properly oxidized and rendered harmless, they 
irritate and upset the delicate nervous mechanism that 
controls the secretory, circulatory and nutritive functions 
of the renal glands, the pancreas and the suprarenal 
capsules—the three organs directly involved in the pro- 
duction of these diseases. 
That the Sanborn Treatment in some way stimulates the 
oxidation processes or has to do with assisting the faulty, 
fagged or diseased function of the internal secretory glands 
—to which an increasing number of medical authorities now 
attribute many bodily diseases and imperfections—is evi- 
denced by the results it accomplishes. 
Whatever the explanation, the fact remains that many 
hundreds seriously ill with these insidious and dangerous 
diseases recover complete health as a result of the Sanborn 
treatment, and, after all, what the victim of Diabetes and 
Bright’s Disease really wants to know is — not what the 
actual or underlying cause of his disease is, but how he 
can get rid of it. 
This question seems to have been answered in a remark- 
able degree by Dr. Sanborn, who, in a lifetime of earnest 
endeavor, has given humanity a boon the value of which 
can be measured only in terms of mended function and the 
saving of precious lives. 
40 The Sanborn Treatment 
41 
HOW THE SUGAR OUTPUT VARIES 
During the progress of treatment by the Sanborn 
method, the sugar content may vary from time to time. 
In fact, it is rather to be expected that sugar will continue 
to be present for some considerable period after beginning 
treatment. 
This is largely because of the fact that it is considered 
of far greater importance that a diabetic may partake of 
an adequate and nourishing diet, and digest and assimilate 
the same, than that he should be rendered sugar-free at 
once. 
In this, the average physician who depends on the effects 
of a starvation diet, and who knows nothing of the specific 
results of medication in certain phases of these disorders, 
commits a great error. 
He bends every effort toward keeping his patient from 
eliminating sugar, even though the patient be maintained 
on a diet so low in energy-yielding values as to sap his 
strength, and markedly weaken vital resistance. 
As a matter of fact, there are a number of other patho- 
logic states for which tests and examinations are made in 
connection with the Sanborn Treatment that have quite as 
much bearing on the case as do the sugar findings. 
The results of the Sanborn Treatment, not in a few 
cases, but in hundreds upon hundreds, removes all doubt 
that the proper kind of medication is of tremendous value 
in enabling the diabetic or the nephritic to digest, assimilate 
and metabolize an increased amount of food. 
DURATION OF TREATMENT 
As to the duration of treatment, it would be utterly im- 
possible definitely to forecast the time required in any case. 
Six months to eight months seems to be the average. Some- 
times it takes longer. On the other hand, three or four 
months have sufficed in many cases. And, of course, there 42 
Back to Health 
have been cases wherein the objective of the treatment 
could not be accomplished, irrespective of the time. 
This objective is the elimination of both the physical 
and urinary findings in Diabetes or in Bright’s — with 
reasonable assurance of non-recurrence under a practically 
unrestricted diet. CHAPTER VII 
HOW THE PATIENT MAY HURRY HIS RELIEF 
A LITTLE CHAT WITH DR. SANBORN 
In this chapter, Dr. Sanborn has epitomized for us the 
instruction usually given her patients. It is valuable advice, 
built on sound judgment and long experience. It should 
prove exceedingly useful to every reader who, himself, is a 
diabetic or nephritic. 
But, let Dr. Sanborn tell it herself:— 
“Nature’s restorer and upbuilder is food. You cannot 
regain and cannot keep your health and strength without 
it — in proper balance and quantity. Starvation means 
depletion instead of restoration. We recognize this from the 
start and are generous in our food allowance, both as to 
variety and quantity. 
“Where the patient’s condition warrants, the diet is 
practically unrestricted and nourishing. Upbuilding foods 
in proper balance and quantity are permitted, leaving the 
medicine to take care of the disease. In other cases, a 
specific diet is prescribed until the nutritive functions of 
the body are sufficiently restored to permit wider latitude. 
It often happens, especially in Diabetes, that the patient’s 
system has been so depleted by starvation, or semi-starva- 
tion, that strong, nourishing foods cannot wisely be given, 
in the first instance. In such cases, a modified diet is 
directed; in extreme cases, it has been limited to liquid 
foods. 
“Do not permit yourself to forget, however, that over- 
feeding — eating more than normal bodily maintenance 
requires — carries its own penalties; and that any but the 
most modest indulgence in sweets and pastries usually 
amounts to overfeeding, even for those who are well. For 
those who are ill—such indulgence, of course, is inexcusable. 
“Never eat anything which is not digestively agreeable. 
You alone are the judge of this. And you should never 
overload your stomach. Too little is far better than too 
much in a condition such as yours. 
43 44 
Back to Health 
“Whole-wheat bread is best for you, or bran bread when 
constipated. You may also have rye bread, if you care for it. 
White bread I do not recommend. It has been robbed of 
practically everything of value except starch the wheat 
kernel contained, and occupies space that should be given 
to more wholesome and nourishing food. 
“I do not advise the use of saccharin in sweetening. 
Saccharin is a coal-tar product, and is exceedingly irritating 
—especially to the kidney cells. 
“I should prefer that you use chemically pure dextrose, 
instead. Dextrose is almost as sweet as powdered sugar, 
and can be used freely without increasing the sugar output. 
In fact, it tends to decrease the sugar, and to eliminate 
acetone and diacetic acid, because it favors the perfect 
oxidation of the fats, as well as the protein molecule. 
“Be very careful that you do not exercise at any time 
to a point of exhaustion. Even in reading, you should not 
become overtired. Be out-of-doors as much as possible in 
favorable weather, but you must at all times remember that 
in your present condition you are unusually susceptible to 
complicating conditions, and for that reason you must be 
extremely careful that you subject yourself to no undue 
exposure. 
“You must keep regular hours, both as to sleep and 
meals. You should have at least nine or ten hours’ sleep 
each night, preferably from ten o’clock in the evening until 
seven or eight o’clock in the morning. Do not remain in 
bed after eight o’clock, unless for some fairly special reason 
which makes your doing so either necessary or advisable. 
“Many headaches and other disagreeable symptoms are 
due to improper elimination. Remember that you must keep 
your bowels open at all times, and should not have less than 
two movements per day. 
“You must make it a point to keep in close touch with 
the doctors by letter, as well as by the specimens. In fact, 
you should send a letter at the time of mailing each 
specimen, covering all the symptoms as to how you are The Sanborn Treatment 
45 
feeling. Do not hesitate to write at any time, and if you 
are in doubt upon any point, no matter how trivial it might 
seem to you, be sure to ask, so that it can be made plain 
to you. 
“And after all signs of sugar or albumin—the telltale of 
Diabetes and Bright’s Disease—have disappeared, the 
treatment should be continued for a reasonable time, suffi- 
cient to guard against return. 
“If you are subject to ‘gum boils,’ have your teeth 
X-rayed. If there are local infection areas at the roots of 
any of your teeth, it might be well to have such teeth 
removed. See your dentist. 
“If the X-ray shows faulty root canal filling, it would 
be good judgment—and may prove very helpful—to have 
the tooth canal opened up, treated and properly filled. 
“Many cases of Diabetes, Nephritis, rheumatism and 
high blood tension have been caused by nothing more or 
less than poisons absorbed from some local foci of decay 
in the cavity of the mouth. 
“There are many cases on record where these disorders 
have been entirely cleared up by the relief of this septic 
local condition. 
“Boils, ulcers and gangrene are conditions that often 
occasion grave concern, and justly so. The Sanborn Treat- 
ment will usually take care of these conditions by indirect 
action. If necessary, however, special adjunct treatment 
will be prescribed. 
“And one last word:— 
“Cease making analyses and tests. 
“Cease weighing food. 
“Cease figuring ‘calories.’ 
“Simply follow directions— 
and the best of luck, long life and happiness to you.” CHAPTER VIII 
While the diet permitted—or rather encouraged—under 
the Sanborn Treatment—is infinitely more liberal than 
would be generally countenanced even by radical specialists 
today, at the same time, it is absolutely essential, in order 
to secure the quickest and most satisfactory results with 
any method of treatment, to pay scrupulous attention to a 
sensible form of diet. 
With the Sanborn Treatment, however, it is not advised 
that a “restricted diet” be undertaken, in the sense that 
the word “restricted” usually conveys. 
For it is not so much to eliminate carbohydrate from the 
diet as it is to develop a diet that will be thoroughly 
balanced in the proper proportions of proteid, fats, sugars, 
starches and mineral salts. 
Dr. Sanborn contends that the restriction of a nephritic, 
for instance, to a diet of skimmed milk and fruit, as is so 
frequently insisted upon in this condition, is one of the 
surest and most definite ways of robbing the patient of 
his last slim chance of life. 
For it not only deprives him of needed building material 
and body fuel, but, by creating pathological fermentative 
changes, it adds immeasurably to his excessive stock of 
indol and other putrefactive poisons. 
Also, the drastic reduction in the carbohydrate intake 
exerts an even more deleterious influence upon the organism 
—as it utterly destroys the normal food balance. 
Dr. Sanborn is absolutely convinced—as the result of 
more than a quarter century of experience and observation 
— that the best and most rational diet for any under- 
oxidation disorder — whether it be Diabetes, Nephritis, 
rheumatism, or increased uric acid production — is a 
properly balanced diet. 
It is, of course, impossible to give a concrete general 
diet, suitable to every case, because of the varying condi- 
tions of patients. As a matter of fact, and particularly 
WHAT TO EAT 
46 The Sanborn Treatment 
47 
during the earlier stages of the treatment, the selection may 
range all the way from an all-liquid diet in one case to 
anything and everything on the most liberal list in other 
cases. 
The better to visualize just what is or is not permissible 
under the Sanborn regime, we append a specimen menu 
containing an entire week’s food allowance — such as is 
available to the average patient in four to six weeks after 
the treatment is instituted. You will note the absence of 
any reference to grams, calories and so forth:— 
SUNDAY 
BREAKFAST 
Grapefruit 
Oatmeal 
Soft boiled eggs 
Bread and butter 
Coffee 
DINNER 
Soup 
Roast beef or lamb 
Baked potato 
Cauliflower or string 
beans 
Combination salad 
Jello 
Coffee 
SUPPER 
Cold roast beef or 
lamb 
One hard boiled egg 
Bread and butter 
Cup custard 
Tea or milk 
MONDAY 
BREAKFAST 
Orange 
Cream of Wheat 
Poached eggs and 
bacon 
Bread and butter 
Coffee 
LUNCHEON 
Sardines or smoked 
fish 
Bread and butter 
Lettuce and tomato 
salad 
Cheese 
Tea or milk 
DINNER 
Beef stew, with 
vegetables 
Bread and butter 
Asparagus or green 
peas 
Tapioca pudding 
Tea or milk 
TUESDAY 
Grapefruit 
Shredded wheat 
Omelet 
Bread and butter 
Coffee 
Smoked fish 
Any green vegetable 
Combination salad 
Bread and butter 
Cheese 
Tea or milk 
Soup 
Steak 
Baked potato 
Spinach 
Celery 
Orange ice 
Coffee, tea or milk 
WEDNESDAY 
Baked apple 
Oatmeal 
Ham and eggs 
Bread and butter 
Coffee 
Baked or broiled fish 
Any green vegetable 
Bread and butter 
Cheese 
Tea or milk 
Soup 
Lamb chops 
Brussels sprouts or 
asparagus 
Vegetable salad 
Bread and butter 
Tea or milk 48 
Back to Health 
THURSDAY 
Grapefruit 
Any kind of cereal 
Poached eggs 
Bread and butter 
Coffee 
Soup 
Any green vegetable 
Cheese 
Jello 
Tea or milk 
Chicken, roasted or 
stewed 
Baked potato 
Bread and butter 
Green peas 
Lettuce and tomato 
salad 
Coffee, tea or milk 
FRIDAY 
Stewed prunes 
Oatmeal 
Bacon and eggs 
Bread and butter 
Coffee 
Soup 
Any green vegetable 
Corn bread and butter 
Combination salad 
Tea or milk 
Fish of any kind, 
baked or broiled 
Any green vegetable 
Combination salad 
Tapioca pudding 
Tea or milk 
SATURDAY 
Grapefruit 
Any cereal 
Scrambled eggs, with 
ham or bacon 
Bread and butter 
Coffee 
Soup 
Sardines, with lemon 
Bread and butter 
Vegetable salad 
Tea or milk 
Beef stew, with 
carrots and onions 
Bread and butter 
Cup custard 
Cheese 
Coffee, tea or milk 
NOTES 
Potatoes should always be thoroughly baked or boiled in the 
skin. Bread means whole wheat, rye or bran. 
Dextrose or a little saccharin may be used for sweetening as 
necessary, until sugar is permitted. 
Soups—unthickened, from any good soup stock. (Canned soups 
may be used.) 
Between meals, fresh fruits of any kind may be taken with 
the exception of bananas. Also, milk or buttermilk, malted milk 
or egg-nog. 
Ham and bacon should always be broiled. 
Do not toast bread without special permission. 
Use French dressing on salads. 
Cream may be used on cereals and in coffee. 
Cheese—Cottage or American. 
Please remember that variety of foods is desirable in 
order to stimulate the appetite and maintain a proper 
balance. It would not do to make an entire meal, for 
instance, out of starchy foods, such as bread, potatoes, 
vegetables and cereals. Neither should an entire meal be 
made out of protein foods, such as meat, fish, eggs, cheese, The Sanborn Treatment 
49 
etc. Neither would fruits alone do. Keep the balance in 
mind. 
CHRISTMAS MENU OF A VERY BAD CASE 
It may be interesting to some well-advanced case of 
Diabetes to note what Dr. Sanborn permits occasionally 
to those ordinarily kept as close to the starvation point as 
is possible, without pushing the patient over the ragged 
edge of collapse. 
Here is what one of the very worst cases ever treated 
by Dr. Sanborn was allowed by way of a little laxity for 
his holiday menu:— 
BREAKFAST 
Strained juice of two 
oranges 
Broiled bacon and two 
poached eggs 
Two slices whole wheat 
bread, with butter 
Coffee and cream 
DINNER 
Celery and olives 
Roast turkey 
Baked potato 
Canned spinach 
Asparagus tip salad, 
with French dressing 
Jello 
Tea, with lemon 
SUPPER 
Cup chicken broth 
(canned) 
Cold turkey 
Two slices whole wheat 
bread, with butter 
It would take a person a long time to starve to death 
on a diet of this character. So, from these menus, it can 
readily be seen that there is an abundance of the usual 
nourishing, wholesome foods, — including meat, fish or 
poultry, once and not more than twice a day, — with 
plenty of green vegetables. 
The following restrictions are recommended by Dr. 
Sanborn, at least during the earlier periods of treatment: 
Moderate amount of sugar and sweets, if any at all. No 
white bread. Use instead, untoasted whole wheat bread or 
bran bread; bran especially if constipated. No pork, except 
bacon and ham. Fruits (except bananas) may be taken 
midway between meals; none with meals, except an orange 
or grapefruit at breakfast. 
Most of these restrictions are merely such as a perfectly 
healthy, normal person ought generally to observe, with 
any indulgence the exception, and not the rule. An athlete 50 
Back to Health 
in training would be held to most of them. They are not so 
much restrictions, therefore, as sound dietetic rules. 
It is a fact, as the medical profession generally will soon 
concede, that nothing but food can rebuild wasted tissue 
or renew strength and energy; and that while seeking 
restoration one should confine himself to foods which have 
high restorative value, and not allow foods of low restora- 
tive value to take their place. He should cater to his bodily 
needs rather than to his palate. 
Also, it must not be forgotten that overeating, instead of 
being curative and productive of increased health and 
strength, may in itself be a cause of disease, even in a 
well person. 
Dr. Sanborn has the true appreciation of the value to 
an invalid of husbanding and conserving his vital forces. 
Therefore, to each and every patient she says:— 
“During the process of your restoration, strength and 
energy must be carefully conserved. Under no circum- 
stances permit yourself to become overtired or to approach 
exhaustion in any degree—and this means mentally as well 
as physically. Stop well within your limitations, for you 
can easily tear down much faster than we can possibly 
build up.” CHAPTER IX 
Acidosis is the coup de grace which Nature reserves for 
the diabetic. It is the cause of the coma which ushers in 
the last chapter of his life. Acidosis arises mainly from 
the incomplete combustion of the fats; for it is evident 
that fats can be completely oxidized only when carbohydrate 
is being simultaneously burned. 
As one writer expresses it: “Fat only burns completely 
in a fire of carbohydrate. If the carbohydrate fire lags or 
goes out, as it does in Diabetes, then the fat fire smokes. 
The smoke is oxybutyric acid.” 
The philosophy of this condition is very simple. The 
facts are these: Owing to the inability of the system to 
utilize the carbohydrates, and to store the unburned product 
as glycogen, the carbohydrate is hurried through the system, 
and lost to the animal economy. 
Therefore the energy required to run the body machinery 
must be provided for by the proteins and fats. The proteins 
are easily utilized, but apparently it takes so much draught 
to consume them that there is not enough oxygen left 
properly to oxidize the fats. 
“acidosis” 
WHERE THE POISON COMES FROM 
The products of this incomplete combustion accumulate 
in the system and overcome the patient. As Osier says: 
“He is suffocated quite as effectually as he would be from 
the carbonic oxide of a charcoal stove.” The chief product 
of this incomplete combustion of the fats is B-oxybutyric 
acid, which in itself is a source of diacetic acid and acetone. 
In acidosis, the fixed alkaline bases of the body are 
depleted in the effort to maintain blood alkalinity. But 
carbonate is lacking to combine with the carbon-dioxide— 
the CO, — in the tissues. So the tissues are loaded up 
with this C 02, which cannot be taken up by the blood, 
51 52 
Bach to Health 
carried to the lungs, and burned in the white fire of the 
oxygen taken into the system during the act of respiration. 
Instead, the blood—even the venous blood—becomes 
charged with oxygen, until it becomes almost as bright as 
is the arterial blood. Then develops that dyspnea (short- 
ness of breath) without the cyanosis—the bluish discolora- 
tion—so generally found in underoxidation. 
The successful removal of acidosis symptoms depends 
largely upon early recognition of the condition. This is 
determined most quickly and readily by the increased 
ammonia content of the urine. 
In fact, the quantity of ammonia elaborated by the metab- 
olism and excreted in the urine is a measure of the reaction 
of the body to counteract acidosis and maintain blood 
alkalinity. If the twenty-four-hour total ammonia does not 
exceed three or four grams, the acidosis is usually not con- 
sidered serious. 
A LAWYER CANNOT SUCCESSFULLY PLEAD 
HIS OWN CASE 
While many informed patients are qualified by expe- 
rience to make the various tests for acetone and diacetic 
acid, and are thoroughly familiar with the Gerhardt ferric 
chloride reaction, as well as with Legal’s and Folin’s tests, 
it is deemed much better that the patient does not concern 
himself too much with the urinic tests. 
The lawyer does not try to plead his own case; the 
physician does not attempt to prescribe for himself, or 
even for members of his own family. So, for infinitely 
better reasons, the patient should not attempt to judge his 
progress by laboratory methods. His technique may at 
times be faulty, or the strength and accuracy of his reagents 
may vary in a way that might produce serious discrepancies 
in the end-results of his calculations. 
Perhaps the best means for noting significant lowered 
tissue alkalinity lies in the increasing languor, drowsiness, The Sanborn Treatment 
53 
and disinclination to do anything—together with the sensa- 
tion of not getting sufficient air, accompanied by the 
tendency to take deep, full breaths. Even where these 
symptoms might be attributed to some other cause,—which 
would be most usual,—the attempt to eradicate them would 
be, in any event, highly constructive. 
This is best done by taking an alkaline enema of a 
strength of two ounces of sodium bicarbonate to the pint. 
Liberal quantities of soda bicarbonate should be taken by 
the mouth—a teaspoonful in a glass of water, repeated 
every two hours, is not too much. 
DIET IN COMBATING ACIDOSIS 
Citrus fruits—oranges, lemons and grapefruit—tend to 
prevent acidosis and may be freely used, as their weak 
acids are split off into alkaline bases by the digestive 
process, and help, in this way, to alkalinize the blood 
and tissues. 
A BAKED POTATO HELPFUL 
It is a matter of scientific knowledge that a diabetic can 
tolerate on an average of three times as much potato 
(weighed raw) as he can of white-flour bread. The whole 
potato contains approximately 20 per cent of sugar and 
starches, 2.5 per cent of protein, and a trace of fat. But 
the most valuable things it contains—considered for the 
purpose of warding off acidosis — are calcium, potassium 
and iron. 
The alkalinity of the potato, it may be stated, is esti- 
mated by Prof. H. C. Sherman, of Columbia University, 
at 8.6. This, of course, only when baked, or boiled in the 
skin, so as to retain the mineral salts. 
In our ignorance of food preparation, the potato and 
other vegetables are usually peeled and sectioned, and 
boiled until all mineral salts and much of the nitrogenous 
matter is extracted. After this is thoroughly accomplished, 
the water is thrown down the kitchen sink. 54 
Bach to Health 
This act of dietetic vandalism effectually converts a 
valuable base-forming alkaline food into a demineralized, 
acid-forming pulp—an actual menace to the health of even 
a healthy individual. The water-leached potato is like all 
other acid-forming food in respect to the fact that not only 
does it refuse to contribute any basic nutrient material for 
the internal secretions, but it also helps to rob them of the 
alkalies already in solution. 
OATMEAL ALSO OF VALUABLE ASSISTANCE 
Van Norden’s very excellent work has also done much 
to establish the value of whole oatmeal (not the scoured 
product) with a little butter fat—to make up the fat defi- 
ciency—in the treatment of Diabetes, and in the relief of 
acidosis. 
The oatmeal should be thoroughly cooked in a double 
boiler, using water slightly salted. While still hot, strain 
through a sieve and add a little butter, well stirred in. 
It is hardly possible, nor is it thought desirable by the 
staff of the Sanborn Laboratories to maintain any of the 
special diets except as emergency measures, as the patient 
tires of them so readily. 
Special diets are intended merely to tide the patient over 
until the condition of acidosis, for which they were origi- 
nally given, has subsided; after wdiich they become merely a 
part of a much more liberal dietary. 
Alcohol is one of the most valuable of therapeutic agents 
in acidosis, as Nebauer, Porter and others have demon- 
strated, and may be used liberally in the form of wine, 
whisky or brandy. 
AN ACIDOSIS VICTIM SHOULD CAREFULLY 
CONSERVE HIS STRENGTH 
And, last of all, an acidosis patient should carefully 
conserve his strength and his heat units. He should go to 
bed and keep warm, thereby avoiding needless loss of body The Sanborn Treatment 
55 
heat through exertion or exposure. Every effort should be 
made to keep him as quiet and tranquil as possible. 
Plenty of liquids should be taken to help flush the 
poisons out of the system. These are best given hot—in the 
form of broths and soups, tea, coffee and hot water or clam 
bouillon. An average of one quart of hot fluids should be 
given every six hours, until the urinary balance is improved, 
or until the symptoms of languor and debility are relieved. 
Fresh air, day and night, and absolute cleanliness of 
the body are most helpful. Yet it is well to avoid the shock 
of extremely cold baths, unless the reaction is very prompt, 
which is rarely the case with the diabetic or a nephritic. 
After all, the successful care of acidosis consists merely 
in the recognition of its fundamental causes, and the use 
of common-sense principles for overcoming the effects of 
these causes; at the same time employing every endeavor 
to eradicate the cause itself. When this is said—it’s all said. CHAPTER X 
WHY THE SANBORN TREATMENT CAN BE ADMINISTERED 
ONLY BY TRAINED SPECIALISTS 
It has been repeatedly asked, “Why cannot the Sanborn 
Treatment be described in detail and the medication out- 
lined so clearly that physicians everywhere could take it 
up and put it into practice with their own patients?” 
The answer to this question is obvious. Physicians 
generally are unqualified to administer the Sanborn Treat- 
ment because the ordinary practitioner is totally unpre- 
pared — by reason of his lack of special training and 
experience — to administer the treatment. 
His medical teaching has been to the effect that the only 
relief in Diabetes lies in the exclusion or in the limitation 
of carbohydrates. 
His dietetic treatment of Bright’s involves the exclusion 
or the limitation of meats. He knows from experience the 
symptoms his patients develop under such a dietary regime, 
and for the little that can be done for them under this 
method, he knows what to do. 
MAKING MEDICINE OF FOOD 
The Sanborn Laboratories’ specialists, on the contrary, 
give carbohydrates in Diabetes, and meat and eggs in 
Bright’s. They believe that there is only one way in 
which a victim of either of these disorders can ever be 
restored to normal—and this is by helping his system to 
digest, assimilate and metabolize food, and to oxidize and 
eliminate the end-products of this food. In other words, 
to use properly converted food as a medicine for the purpose 
of overcoming the pathologies which improperly converted 
food brings about. 
Therefore, symptoms developed by the patient under 
the Sanborn Treatment are entirely different in important 
aspects from the symptoms he might normally develop 
while under orthodox treatment. 
56 The Sanborn Treatment 
57 
These symptoms he will be totally unable to estimate, 
meet or overcome. He must, therefore, learn the Sanborn 
Treatment before he can practice it successfully—exactly 
as he must learn any special branch of medicine or surgery 
before he can practice it successfully. 
He must acquire technique in the Sanborn method just 
as he acquired technique in his present specialty. He must 
understand Sanborn medication,—understand that the in- 
gredients which are given differ in different cases, and at 
different times in the same case. The practitioner must 
know how these medicines operate under those varying 
conditions; what symptoms will or may develop; and what 
to do under those conditions. Without this knowledge 
clearly and fully at his command, he would be unable intel- 
ligently to use the Sanborn medication, even though it 
were placed at his disposal. 
THE LAST WORD IN LABORATORY EQUIPMENT 
The Sanborn Laboratories are equipped with expensive 
and the most delicate apparatus, such as few physicians in 
all the country possess, and only the most perfectly 
equipped college laboratories can boast. Many of the 
results and determinations made in these laboratories would 
be considered impossible of achievement by the average 
practitioner, whose laboratory is inadequate, and whose 
urinary examinations are often wholly inadequate. 
MORE IN THE URINE THAN MOST DOCTORS 
EVER FIND 
Also, the ordinary practitioner is satisfied with a brief 
test. He would be apt to smile if told that the Sanborn 
Laboratories’ analyses often require twenty-four hours. 
As a matter of fact, Dr. Sanborn, for more than twenty 
years, has been laughed at as either amateurish or old- 
fogyish, or both, for devoting so much time to this work. 
Yet a physician or a patient who attempts his own urinary 58 
Back to Health 
examinations along orthodox lines may easily be deceived 
by a faulty or an incomplete analysis. The absence of 
sugar, for instance, may prove utterly deceptive in a given 
specimen. In this way, physicians have been known 
wrongly to diagnose serious cases of Diabetes, because no 
sugar showed. 
It may, for example, be news to most diabetics to know 
that there are two types of glycosuria—which may be dis- 
tinctly differentiated by a complete urinalysis. In one of 
these types, the glucose as found in the urine is the result 
of extrinsic causes, such as eating too much, inability to 
oxidize, lack of out-of-door exercise, and so forth. In the 
other type of glycosuria, there is some well-defined intrinsic 
change, which plays an important role in the production 
of the glucose and its presence in the urine. 
SUGAR SOMETIMES THE LEAST IMPORTANT FACTOR 
In connection with the question of urinalysis, it may be 
pertinent to ask: “If the sugar content alone were the sole 
factor to be determined, would not the absence of sugar 
imply a negative Diabetes, or a freedom from pathological 
conditions ?” 
In this respect, it is interesting to note that the Sanborn 
Laboratories’ specialists have had many cases running an 
extraordinarily high percentage of sugar, which permitted 
the most favorable prognosis. These cases readily yielded 
to treatment by Sanborn medication. On the other hand, 
many cases of Diabetes have applied for treatment which 
were sugar-free, and yet from whom little or no response 
could be hoped for under any treatment. 
THREE TYPES OF ALBUMIN AND THEIR 
SIGNIFICANCE 
With albumin, as sugar, the urinary test discloses several 
types. The very translucent type of albumin indicates 
merely a slight disturbance in metabolism, but without The Sanborn Treatment 
59 
retrograde changes in the kidney cells, either present or 
proximate. 
A second type, which is decidedly opaque, is seen in 
varying amounts. 
Then there is a third type in which the precipitate is in 
the form of a highly caseous, dense mass. This form 
usually indicates a pronounced parenchymatous metamor- 
phosis taking place in the renal cells, and is of a most 
serious nature. It is usually most pronounced in syphilitic 
cases; less fatal, however, in this connection than in the 
absence of this infection. 
In the face of these facts, it is obvious that a peculiar 
knowledge of a distinct technique is required for the proper 
administration of this treatment. An amateur would only 
bungle the matter, and bring discredit upon the treatment, 
and disability or death to the patient. CHAPTER XI 
A HUMAN INTEREST STORY 
Perhaps the most convincing proof of the value of any 
form of medical treatment is a statement from the lips of 
one who has gone down into the Valley of the Shadow and 
has come back to the bright sunlight of perfect health 
and strength. 
To a diabetic who, month after month, finds himself 
sinking deeper and deeper into the quicksand, there can 
be no story of more transcendent interest. 
We have, therefore, asked Mr. Charles S. Harmon, 
former President of the Analytical Laboratories, Inc., to 
tell his story here in detail. The recital should light a 
flame of hope for many who now merely screw their 
courage to the sticking-point — braced with fortitude to 
meet the inevitable. 
A STATEMENT BY CHARLES S. HARMON 
“In 1910, after months of gradual decline in weight and 
strength, with constantly increasing parching and thirst, 
and greatly disturbed sleep and rest because of the fre- 
quency of urination, I finally broke down, and was confined 
to bed at the Hotel Seville, in New York City, where I 
was then staying. For the first time in years I was attended 
by a physician, Dr. Purdy, the house physician, being 
called by the manager of the hotel. 
“Dr. Purdy told me that I had Diabetes, and that in 
spite of my reduced physical condition and consequent weak- 
ness, my only hope of relief lay in rigorous diet and rest. 
“This was later confirmed by other medical opinion, and 
I was told that, because my percentage of sugar was so 
high, no treatment was likely to do me any good. The 
advice of the best London and Paris specialists gave me 
no greater hope. 
“By rigid dieting, rest and extreme care I was able to 
get about again, but lacked the strength and energy that 
60 The Sanborn Treatment 
61 
always had been mine, because in order to keep the sugar 
down I was obliged to deny myself the nourishing foods 
my system needed. 
“I was at that time senior member of a prominent law 
firm, doing an extensive law business in Chicago. 
“In 1913 my law offices were closed by my clerks, my 
office furniture and equipment being placed in storage. 
In spite of the most rigid dieting and the best my doctors 
could do for me, my condition grew worse, so in 1914 I 
had to be operated upon for a serious diabetic swelling 
on my neck. This operation was performed at the Albany 
Hospital, Albany, N. Y., by Dr. A. W. Elting. 
“Later, in January, 1915, by Dr. Elting’s advice and 
in the same hospital, I took the Allen treatment for 
Diabetes under the direction of Dr. I. W. Gorham, an 
Albany physician, who was then fresh from the Rockefeller 
Institute in New York City, and a specialist in that class 
of work. 
“After five days of absolute starvation, without a 
mouthful of anything but water, sugar had disappeared 
from my urine, and the slow process of developing what 
the doctor called my ‘tolerance for carbohydrates’ began. 
“My prescribed diet was very limited, and for months 
I carried with me little scales on which my food was care- 
fully weighed at each meal. I continued to be weak, and, in 
effect, was spending all my time in keeping myself alive. 
“Even this care did not suffice to keep me sugar-free, or 
even to keep the sugar from increasing, and later, in 1916, 
1 was taken to the Lakeside Hospital, in Chicago, where I 
was operated upon for serious diabetic swellings on my 
right leg by Dr. A. R. Johnstone, chief of the surgical 
staff, and Dr. Charles H. Loder, my family physician. 
“After leaving the hospital, I remained under Dr. 
Loder’s care, and by his direction reinforced a rigid diet 
by frequent fasts—usually one day each week—often more 
—of actual starvation. 62 
Bach to Health 
“In April, 1917, I was induced by William H. Dyren- 
forth, Esq., General Patent Counsel for the Standard Oil 
Company, and senior member of the firm of Dyrenforth, 
Lee, Chritton & Wiles, to see Dr. I. M. Sanborn, and take 
up the Sanborn Treatment. Mr. Dyrenforth was an old- 
time friend and associate of mine, who himself had been 
cured of Diabetes and Bright’s Disease by the Sanborn 
Treatment four years before. Later, his daughter-in-law, 
living in Florida, had been likewise cured—without ever 
having seen her benefactor. 
“On April 25, 1917, I presented myself to Dr. Sanborn 
for treatment. The analysis of my urine at that time was:— 
Specific Gravity 1.040 
Acid'itv 65 Degrees 
Urea .3 
Sugar 11.4 Per Cent 
Acetone Heavy 
Diacetic Acid Light 
“It may seem almost incredible to diabetics and to 
physicians familiar with the treatment of diabetes, yet, in 
a comparatively short time, during which I was put on a 
wholesome, nourishing, upbuilding diet, a decided improve- 
ment was manifested. After three months I felt positive 
that I was going to be cured. My sugar and other diabetic 
conditions gradually cleared up, and in about nine months 
I was fully restored to health. 
“My weight, which for years had been about 200 pounds, 
under the influence of the disease and the treatment I was 
taking, fell as low as 128 pounds. Under the Sanborn 
Treatment it increased to 166, to 170 pounds, which was 
quite enough for my height. 
“My strength and energy are said to be unusual for one 
of my age, sixty-nine years. I deny myself absolutely 
nothing that I wish in the way of food, and am in every 
respect living and enjoying life almost as I did twenty-five 
years ago. “Charles S. Harmon, 
“University Club, Chicago, 111.” The Sanborn Treatment 
63 
Mr. Harmon, who is a lawyer like his distinguished 
relative, Gov. Judson Harmon of Ohio, had been in active 
practice of his profession for many years, with offices in 
both New York and Chicago, at the time he was stricken 
down with Diabetes. 
In earlier years he was closely associated with the late 
Judge Christian C. Kolsatt, of the United States District 
and Circuit Courts of Chicago, but in later years devoted 
himself to corporation law. CHAPTER XII 
ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE 
This chapter is a challenge — a challenge to the most 
rigid investigation. The claims made in it are substantiated 
by the irrefutable testimony of men and women of irre- 
proachable integrity. These men and women gladly and 
cheerfully testify that while they were sick, some of them 
with the Clammy Hand of Death almost at their throats, 
they are now well. 
They have given their testimony in the goodness of their 
hearts, and in the sincere desire to help others find the path 
by which they climbed back into wholesome life. They are 
grateful and highly appreciative of the broad, generous 
sympathy of the good woman doctor and of her associates 
of the Sanborn Laboratories whose skill and profound 
knowledge in their specialty have restored them once more 
to the fulness of health. 
These men and women have, under the Sanborn Treat- 
ment, recovered from Diabetes and Nephritis—two of the 
most desperate and fatal diseases that afflict humans when 
allowed to develop into the degenerative stages* that char- 
acterize these disorders. 
They are now well. Many of them have been well for 
years following this remarkable treatment. They know 
they are well, not alone because they feel well, and are once 
more restored to a full life of usefulness, but also because 
Diabetes and Nephritis are the two diseases which admit 
of no question. 
Either one has, or has not, Nephritis or Diabetes. There 
is no guesswork about the diagnosis. For the presence or 
the absence of either of these disorders can be determined 
by scientific laboratory tests in conjunction with the 
clinical findings. 
When there is a complete clearing up of all pathological 
evidence in the urine,—even to such an extent that appli- 
cations for heavy life insurance policies are favorably 
64 The Sanborn Treatment 
65 
passed upon,—and when the very obvious clinical symptoms 
are entirely removed, there is positive evidence that these 
patients are no longer suffering from either Bright’s Disease 
or Diabetes. 
NOT A MATTER OF FAITH OR FEELING 
It is not a matter of faith or feeling. It is not a condition 
which permits of the corrective or curative value of the 
mental state—as is frequently the case in neurasthenia, or 
in many conditions which the influence of suggestion or any 
subconscious mental activity may bring about. 
Diabetes and Nephritis are very definite abnormal 
states, capable of determination by any qualified medical 
examiner, and capable of being checked up by any number 
of independent examiners, as hundreds of these cases 
have been. 
CAN BRIGHT’S DISEASE AND DIABETES BE CURED? 
Read these letters and these laboratory reports and then 
judge for yourself. They need no comment. 
St. Joseph, Mich. 
Dear Dr. Sanborn:— 
In June, 1911, when I had been suffering from Bright’s Disease 
for a long time, your treatment very fortunately was recom- 
mended to me. I began the treatment at once and by October 
of the same year albumin had entirely cleared. By December, 
1911, I was completely cured, and since that time my health has 
been normal. « 
I cheerfully recommend your treatment to others, and authorize 
you to refer anyone to me at any time. 
Wishing you and your treatment the success deserved, I am, 
Gratefully yours, 
(Signed) Mbs. E. A. Graham. 
When Mrs. Graham, the widow of the founder of the 
Graham & Morton Lines of Great Lakes Steamships, first 
came under Dr. Sanborn’s treatment, her urine showed 
as follows:— 66 
Bach to Health 
Specific Gravity 1.004 
Reaction Alkaline 
Sugar Trace 
Albumin Very Heavy 
Under the microscope there were many fine granular 
casts and a few hyaline, many pus cells, squamous epi- 
thelium, bacteria and many urates. 
Mrs. Graham began to improve almost from the very 
beginning of treatment, and in the course of six months she 
felt perfectly well. The treatment, however, was extended 
a little beyond that time, to obviate all reasonable possibility 
of a recurrence. She was discharged by Dr. Sanborn on 
Jan. 15, 1912, free from every evidence of Nephritis, and 
remained so uninterruptedly to the date of this writing. 
The chief thing to emphasize, however, is the fact that 
the earlier in the stage of the disease the treatment is 
instituted, the more readily it responds. The longer treat- 
ment is deferred, in useless experiments with inadequate 
and weakening measures, the more difficult it becomes to 
bring about a complete restoration of health. 
A GRATEFUL TRIBUTE 
Mount St. Scholastica’s Academy, 
Canon City, Colo., July 25, 1922. 
Dear Dr. Sanborn:— 
To be grateful in the ordinary sense is commonplace and has 
no special significance, but to be grateful for the saving of life, 
a young life dedicated to God’s service, means that it comes from 
the heart, and such is my gratefulness to you. It is genuine and 
true, and I am ever ready to preach it. 
Five years have now passed since you told me that I need no 
longer consider myself a patient. I hardly needed to be told, 
because I felt and knew that I was again well and strong. But 
it was none the less gratifying to learn that the albumin and casts, 
those two things which I had so justly dreaded until I found 
you, had completely disappeared. 
Need I picture myself before that time? Won’t it do just to 
say that I was not only tuberculous, but that Bright’s Disease 
had fastened its deadly grip upon me and that, by reason of it, The Sanborn Treatment 
67 
on three occasions—occasions which I will long remember, but 
which no longer haunt me—I was told that I could not live more 
than a few months at the best! 
In all fairness, I think you must share with this wonderful 
climate my thanks for relieving my tuberculosis, but you alone 
do I thank for ridding me of the dreadful Bright’s Disease. I am 
entirely free from it. 
Devotedly, 
(Signed) Rev. Robert M. Hennesey, C. M. 
Father Hennesey was sent to Colorado on account of his 
tuberculous condition by the famous Dr. John B. Murphy, 
of Chicago, who was his friend as well as his physician. 
While there, Bright’s Disease developed, for which he was 
successively treated by three Denver physicians — Drs. 
Carlin, Mathews and Monaghan. Finally, he learned of 
Dr. Sanborn’s treatment. 
In fourteen months he was pronounced cured. One of 
his former physicians, who chanced to meet him in Denver 
after Dr. Sanborn discharged him, was amazed, calling his 
cure absolutely miraculous. 
Mr. P. M. Heimbach is a department head for Marshall 
Field & Co., Chicago, with which firm he has been connected 
for more than thirty years. On Feb. 15, 1911, he began 
treatment with Dr. Sanborn. He was suffering from 
Bright’s Disease, and found it very difficult to meet the 
exacting duties of his position. In fact, he found it neces- 
sary to remain in bed for a day or two at frequent intervals, 
and was rapidly on the decline in spite of the very best 
that many specialists had been able to do for him. 
At that time his urine showed in part:— 
Specific Gravity 1.008 
Reaction Mildly Alkaline 
Albumin Heavy 
Under the microscope there were many casts, both 
granular and hyaline, many pus cells and several calcium 
oxalates. 68 
Back to Health 
In July, 1912, Mr. Heimbach was discharged as cured,- 
and has had no recurrence whatever of any of the conditions 
for which he was treated. His urine was absolutely negative 
at the time of his discharge, and has so remained throughout 
these ten and more years. His weight, strength and vitality 
were at par at the time of his discharge and have remained 
so without interruption to the time of this writing. 
It is our policy to make occasional examinations for at 
least a year subsequent to a patient’s discharge. This 
enables us to guard against any recurrence. In only a very 
small per cent of the many hundreds of discharged cases 
has it been found necessary or advisable to resume the 
treatment: 
Dr. E. D. Perkins, Sutter, Calif., April 3, 1923. 
The Sanborn Laboratories, 
Battle Creek, Mich. 
Dear Dr. Perkins: I was very glad indeed to get your letter 
of March 27th, advising me that it would be safe for me to dis- 
continue the treatment. I would have kept on for another month 
had you wished, but I am glad it will not be truly necessary. 
I will send a specimen at intervals of about eight weeks, 
according to your instructions, and will finish such medicines as 
I have on hand. 
It has been several years since I have been in such good health 
as I now find myself. Before I knew I had any trouble with my 
kidneys I suffered such dreaufui headaches almost continually 
and was dizzy, my eyes hurt and vision affected. Then last March 
(a year ago) I had an acute attack, when the doctor was called 
in and I learned the real trouble. I was dreadfully sick then and 
bloated all over. A milk diet helped me over this attack a little 
and then I heard of the Sanborn Treatment. 
My strength has now returned so that I can do all my work 
and, besides, I enjoy it. I can again take my place socially, 
do club work and all the other things that had made my life 
happy. 
And so you see how truly grateful I am for my health to be 
restored in such a degree as I now find it. Please accept my 
thanks for your interest and wise counsel. I have found nothing 
unpleasant during the entire course of treatment and corre- 
spondence. 
Sincerely yours, 
(Signed) Mrs. C. C. Epperson. The Sanborn Treatment 
69 
. A FEW CONDENSED REPORTS OF TYPICAL CASES 
DISCHARGED AS CURED 
Mr. W. H. Dyrenforth is senior member of the firm of 
Dyrenforth, Lee, Cliritton & Wiles, Marquette Building, 
Chicago, and is General Patent Counsel for the Standard 
Oil Company, in addition to other important connections. 
When Mr. Dyrenforth first presented himself for treat- 
ment, in September, 1912, his urine at that time showed in 
part as follows:— 
Specific Gravity 1.046 
Reaction Acid 
Albumin Heavy Trace 
Sugar 10.8 Per Cent 
Acetone Heavy 
Diacetic Acid Heavy 
Of course he was emaciated and in a very critical con- 
dition, just as the urinary findings would indicate. He was 
discharged in January, 1914, having completely regained 
his health and vigor, and with a negative urine. It took 
sixteen months to accomplish this, but even that is a short 
time when the seriousness of the case and the permanence 
of the results of the treatment are taken into consideration. 
Mr. Dyrenforth has had no return whatever of Diabetes 
in either the clinical or the pathological findings, and is 
one of the most active men in his profession today. 
Mrs. John Collette, of Chicago, 111., presented herself 
for treatment on July 4, 1919. At that time she was thirty 
years of age and her urine showed in part:— 
Specific Gravity 1.034 
Reaction Acid 
Sugar 6.1 Per Cent 
Acetone Heavy 
Diacetic Acid Trace 
By September, 1919, every symptom, both physical and 
urinary, had been cleared up, and she was discharged as 
cured on Nov. 12, 1919. 70 
Back to Health 
Miss Gladys Blair is the daughter of a prominent mer- 
chant of Owosso, Mich. On Oct. 5, 1911, she came under 
Dr. Sanborn’s treatment for Diabetes. She was then twelve 
years of age, very weak and emaciated, and confined to the 
house most of the time. She had been under treatment by 
local physicians and specialists from Detroit for nearly 
two years. When the Sanborn Treatment was instituted, 
her urine showed in part:— 
Specific Gravity 1.039 
Reaction Sharply Acid 
Sugar 4.7 Per Cent 
Acetone Heavy Trace 
Diacetic Acid Negative 
After nine months’ treatment she was a perfectly normal 
girl for her age and the urinary findings were negative. 
There has not been the slightest recurrence of the trouble 
during these many years that have intervened, and she is 
now in perfect health. You will be glad to read a letter 
from her, which follows:— 
Owosso, Mich. 
Dear Dr. Sanborn:— 
Nothing but your letter of recent date would have reminded 
me that I had ever suffered from Diabetes. I am so well now, 
and have been for so many years, that it is hard for me to realize 
that there was ever a time when I was so seriously threatened. 
It was in the latter part of 1911 and after my parents had 
made every effort to bring relief, but with no success, that I first 
came under your care. About all that I remember is that up to 
that time I had been alternately starved and tempted until there 
was little left of me and I had no interest in the future. At that 
time I was only twelve years of age, and did not fully appreciate 
the seriousness of my condition for one of my years. Had I 
really understood it all, I would probably have given up all hope. 
The next thing of importance which I remember is that you 
discharged me less than a year afterward, by which time I was 
again in the fulness of youth and vigor, and without the slightest 
trace of what once had been a severe case of Diabetes in a little 
girl of twelve years of age. 
I have never had the slightest return whatever of it, and shall 
be glad indeed if you will refer anyone to me at any time. 
With every good and sincere wish. 
Sincerely yours, 
(Signed) Gladys Blair. 
Owosso, Mich. The Sanborn Treatment 
71 
A recent letter from Mr. J. C. Crossley, President of 
the Ley-Cross Printing Co., of Chicago, 111., sums up his 
condition at the present time (about a year after his dis- 
charge) in a few, but adequate words. It follows:— 
Chicago, April 20, 1923. 
The Sanborn Laboratories, 
Battle Creek, Mich. 
Dear Sirs: Thanks for your kind letter of the 17th. You folks 
are certainly fine to me and I want you to understand that I 
appreciate it. 
In accordance with your request, I sent you a specimen yester- 
day and hope you will be able to give me a clear report. But, 
anyway, if I am in as good condition as I feel, I must be in the 
Dempsey class! 
I have been eating regular meals, white bread, potatoes, etc., 
etc. . . . Have been doing the work of two men every day and 
sleeping like a log every night. 
Thanks for your many kindnesses. 
Sincerely yours, 
(Signed) J. C. Crossley. 
The specimen to which Mr. Crossley refers in his letter 
showed as follows:— 
Specific Gravity 1.020 
Reaction Mildly Alkaline 
Urea 1.6 
Albumin Negative 
Sugar Negative 
Acetone Negative 
Diacetic Acid Negative 
He would have been passed without question by any 
life insurance examiner. CHAPTER XIII 
HOW THE SANBORN TREATMENT CAN BE GIVEN WITH 
THE UTMOST SUCCESS BY MAIL 
The query may come to your mind, “Can Diabetes and 
Bright’s Disease be successfully treated at home?” 
We unhesitatingly say “Yes”—because for years the 
Sanborn Treatment has been doing that very thing. Hun- 
dreds upon hundreds of patients living in every part of the 
country, whom neither Dr. Sanborn nor any member of her 
medical staff ever saw, have been restored by the Sanborn 
Treatment. Every detail of the treatment was conducted by 
correspondence. 
This is possible because the diagnosis of both Diabetes 
and Bright’s Disease is really made from the urine by 
means of the test tube and microscope, even in office 
patients. A scientific and complete urinalysis tells plainer 
than any words or any description of symptoms possibly 
could tell the patient’s exact condition, how serious or far 
advanced the disease may be, and what his approximate 
chances for recovery are. 
When the diagnosis is made the medicinal remedies can 
be mailed. Instructions regarding diet, hygiene and general 
care can be given in writing as well as orally. In fact, the 
results are usually better. For if given by word of mouth 
the instructions may be forgotten and thus not carried out. 
But if given in writing, the patient has them for continual 
future reference. 
You know from your own experience, and your doctor 
will confirm this, that the true index of your condition—the 
factor more important than any group of how-you-feel, or 
wdiat-you-can-tell symptoms is the condition of the urine on 
analysis. 
This can be told quite as readily if the postman brings it 
as if you bring it. And your medicine can reach you quite as 
readily through being delivered by the mailman as though 
you went or sent to the drug-store after it. 
72 CHAPTER XIV 
WHY WE ADVERTISE 
Mr. Francis H. Sisson, Vice-President of the Guaranty 
Trust Company, of New York, in his 1923 address before 
the Associated Advertising Clubs of the World, at Atlantic 
City, as reported in the Press, placed advertising as a 
“clear call to duty” on the part of those who could, through 
its medium, benefit their fellow-men. 
He said there was no code of ethics that prevented 
professional people from advertising their services as 
merchants advertise their merchandise, and then pointed to 
the fact that many of those who had formerly thought it 
unseemly to advertise had dispelled that “bugbear” through 
realization that the great forward movements had few other 
highways upon which they might travel. This was clinched 
by the assertion that “in the sale of any service as intimate 
and personal as law and medicine, standards of taste might 
readily be involved, but not of ethics.” 
The Sanborn Laboratories, although under the super- 
vision and management of regularly graduated and licensed 
physicians, have unhesitatingly, and without fear or 
apology, adopted the one method recognized by Mr. Sisson 
and all progressive, forward-looking persons as modern and 
competent to reach the greatest number of those who may 
benefit by the discoveries which they have made. 
How else in the lives of the millions of those sufferers 
now living is this knowledge to be brought to their 
attention ? 
Who is to tell them that they can be, in the majority of 
instances, restored to health? Who is to direct them to 
possibly the only source from which help may be expected ? 
However, notwithstanding the fact that even churches 
and ministers of the gospel today advertise their services to 
mankind, many physicians condemn us because of the fact 
that the Sanborn Laboratories make an appeal directly to 
the sufferer. 
73 74 
Bach to Health 
But happily only a very small minority of the rank and 
file of the medical profession are sufficiently narrow-minded 
to advance this objection. The vast majority of fine, big- 
hearted medical men are only too happy to recommend to 
their patients a treatment that has shown such wonderful 
results in hundreds of cases considered beyond help and 
that has the endorsement of so many men and women high 
in the social and business world. 
If your Doctor is really interested in your welfare he 
will put your interest—your restoration to health—above 
every other consideration. We hold that the true mission of 
the physician is to save life. 
If he should attempt to dissuade you, knowing absolutely 
nothing about the Sanborn Treatment or its wonderful work 
in the relief and cure of these deadly diseases, you may 
draw your own conclusions. CHAPTER XV 
SOME REPETITION AND A FEW NEW POINTS 
Diabetes is insidious in its inception, often very gradual 
in its development, but deadly in its results. Many thou- 
sands—many hundreds of thousands—suffer from it and 
when finally awakened to its presence and seriousness are 
all too often informed that nothing better can be done than 
to go upon a starvation diet in hopes of somewhat cheeking 
the progress of the disease. 
Bright’s Disease is equally insidious in its inception, and 
apt to be more rapid in its progress and is equally deadly 
in its results. The number of its victims is appalling and 
far exceeds those from Diabetes. 
The Sanborn Treatment is not the “Fountain of Youth” 
sought by Ponce de Leon. It is not a panacea for all 
ailments. Its wonderful record of achievements is confined 
to Diabetes and Bright’s Disease. But these constitute an 
age-long and world-wide field that a thousand remedies 
have failed to check. 
We do not,however,claim to cure, or materially help ALL 
cases, even, of those diseases. We hold out hope of help to 
all, but some wait until it is too late for any human aid. 
Cases are not uncommon in which the patient’s system 
has been so depleted by starvation, and his power to take 
and assimilate the proper nourishment has been so reduced, 
that when we give him the food his body needs, he has lost 
the ability to take advantage of it. 
Our medicines, themselves, are not nourishment. They 
only make it possible for you to take nourishment in the 
presence of Bright’s Disease or Diabetes, and gradually 
remedy those conditions if your power of assimilation and 
recuperation has not been too far destroyed. 
Continuity of effect is of exceeding importance. Little 
is promised to the intermittent user. The remedies are in 
simple form, easily carried and easily taken, but they 
must be taken regularly, as directed, during the period of 
treatment. 
75 76 
Bach to Health 
There is no “ROYAL ROAD TO HEALTH.” If our 
pathway leads you there, be equally assured that the 
Sanborn Treatment constitutes no ROYAL WARRANT 
permitting those who have reached the goal of health 
through this treatment thereafter to ignore the laws of 
health and right living. As well try to ignore the law of 
gravitation when mountain climbing as to ignore the laws 
that Nature has imposed upon all humankind for the pro- 
motion of health and long life. These words are for your 
guidance after you have been cured. You personally may 
not need them. Some do. We have cured patients enthu- 
siastic—and foolish—enough to think that they are safe— 
with the Sanborn Treatment available—and that everything 
thenceforth is simply carte blanche. 
NATURE CANNOT BUILD WITHOUT FOOD 
Nature’s restorative and builder is FOOD. You cannot 
regain your health and strength without it — in proper 
balance and quantity. Starvation means depletion, weak- 
ness, disease. 
We recognize this and our practice is to put the patient, 
from the start, on as nearly a normal ration as his condition 
will permit. Physically he is greatly run down—his strength 
and vitality are at a low ebb. Our purpose is to build 
him up—to strengthen and to increase his resistance to 
disease and give him greater recuperative powers. 
PERHAPS YOU, TOO, MAY HAVE DIABETES OR 
BRIGHT’S DISEASE 
WITHOUT A THOROUGH EXAMINATION OF YOUR URINE 
YOU CANNOT KNOW 
From most reliable sources we are informed that from 
one to two per cent of the total population have Diabetes; 
while twenty per cent have a more or less well developed 
involvement of the kidneys. In 1917 there were 16.9 deaths 
from Diabetes for every 100,000 population; while 107.4 The Sanborn Treatment 
77 
out of every 100,000 were destroyed by Nephritis or 
Bright’s Disease. 
It is also a universally recognized fact that the fore- 
going mortality figures could be tremendously modified if a 
thorough examination of the urine was made at least once 
a year, that the trouble might be detected and proper steps 
taken to combat the disease at its very inception. A whole 
book might be written on the virtues of early detection 
and prompt treatment of these diseases. The very keystone 
of the successful treatment of both Diabetes and Bright’s 
Disease is PROMPTNESS. 
If you have any cause to suspect either Diabetes or 
Bright’s Disease, or even a tendency toward either, you 
should lose no time in having your urine thoroughly 
examined by some completely equipped, modern laboratory. 
The sufferer should not wait until the ravages of the 
disease or the starvation diet imposed upon him have sapped 
all his physical reserve and destroyed his ability to take and 
assimilate the nourishing food the body needs and must 
have if it is to be restored. When he reaches that stage we 
know as well as those responsible for permitting him to 
reach that stage, that the chances are 100 to 1 against him. 
Sometimes, when urged, we have taken such apparently 
doomed cases in the hope that there might be an unexpected 
reserve sufficient for restoration. Sometimes, not always, we 
have succeeded. No one is warranted in waiting until there 
is only one chance in a hundred left, or what is almost as 
bad, in waiting until the most that expert physicians can 
offer is a more or less prolonged life and that only upon 
condition that he deny himself the things that mean strength 
and energy and ambition, and make life worth living. 
If you suffer from Diabetes and Bright’s Disease, we 
want to help you if we can and if you want us to and will 
give us your full co-operation. Without such co-operation 
on your part, which means faithfully following the sug- 
gestions as to diet and general methods of living that we 
may find applicable to your case, and the taking of such 78 
Bach to Health 
remedies as we will prescribe and send you, you might 
waste your time and also ours—time and effort for which 
your money alone would not pay. 
OUR FINAL WORD 
All our hopes of bringing relief to those suffering from 
Diabetes and Bright’s Disease are predicated upon what 
the Sanborn Treatment has achieved for others. Our con- 
fidence is based upon just such reports as those contained in 
this book. We know no more. You must judge for yourself. 
GAGE PRINTING CO.. LTD., BATTLE CREEK, MICH.