GENERAL
DIRECTIONS 192
treated
with the first Fairchild injections, which have long been recognized as far too
weak, and which are not now on sale anywhere. In France and Italy, whence came
the first rush of requests in 1906, a very large number of cases in 1906
received injections, which at that time were found to possess a tryptic power
of 9.6 tryptic units.
Before
me lies a “list of doctors and hospitals” in Great Britain which were supplied
with certain active preparations of trypsin and amylopsin. The list was
compiled for the information of Dr. Bainbridge. The trypsin injections include
the “regular,” or 125 units, and the “extra special,” or 500 units. The
amylopsin injection had presumably 100 units of strength. The total number of
physicians is 126, of hospitals 43. Of the former, 96 used trypsin of 125
units, and 30 of 500 units. Amylopsin, as a separate injection (100 units of
activity), was ordered by 74 of the 126 physicians, and by 16 of the 43 hospitals.
That is to say, 77 per cent. of the physicians and 79 per cent. of the
hospitals never had a stronger injection of trypsin than 125 units, and
amylopsin was employed by about 59 per cent. of the physicians, and by 37 per
cent. of the hospitals. Some of the latter were large London hospitals, others
special hospitals for the treatment of cancer. These are some of the “fair
trials” given to this scientific treatment. As the strengths of the
preparations employed were entirely in the hands of the physicians and surgeons
concerned, for the makers resolved to be guided by them, it is clear that the
trial of the enzymes in Great Britain was little, if anything, better than the
von Leyden experiments with very weak trypsin in Germany. None the less, Professor
von Leyden wrote (German Journal of Clinical Medicine, vol. lxi., pp.
360-365): “In the therapy of the experiment there lies a new experience
established.