RETROSPECT 175
effects
produced by the action of trypsin upon the tumour-cells can be averted by
sufficiently powerful injections of genuine amylopsin of great strength, made
along with those of trypsin, in all probability in the long run a considerable
shortening of the vital and crucial period of the treatment can be, and will
be, obtained. Again, the resulting liquefaction may be looked upon as being in
essence a separation of the tumour into two main portions,
—a
liquid one, which either must be got rid of as a “seropurulent” discharge, or,
getting into the blood, must be excreted by the skin and kidneys; and a more
solid portion, the skeleton or framework of the tumour-cells, which, if near
the surface, may be sloughed out; if deeper, then encapsulated. In many cases
it may be desirable, once the phenomena of liquefaction have been induced, to
remove the dead tumour by operation, and, so it appears to me, it is at such a
time, when every tumour-cell has been killed and its albumins liquefied, that
surgical intervention is called for, if at all.
The
eighth thesis (p. 32) must be specially noted and challenged. It reads: “That
because of the tendency of injectio trypsini to disintegrate the
tissues, it may be a direct menace to life—(a) by eroding large blood-vessels
(when the disease is contiguous to these structures, as when deep in the neck
or in the pelvis), thus causing death by haemorrhage; (b) when given in
large doses, over considerable periods of time, by overwhelming the system with
toxic products (tumour toxins), thus, in some cases, hastening death.”
Regarding (a), I deny flatly that trypsin has any such action on normal somatic
tissues as that attributed to it by Bainbridge. His conclusion is not in accord
with the tenets of stereochemistry. The statement is a new answer to the old
riddle: “ Why do the stomach and intestines not digest