The civilized and the uncivilized are physically tremendously different. The uncivilized have, as a rule, magnificent teeth good eyesight, a marvellous skin, strong bones, good feet with strong ankles and good arches, obesity and emaciation are rare among them, and they are practically never afflicted by pyorrhoea, tonsillitis, adenoids, narrow mouths a narrow pelvis, which is becoming increasingly frequent among women, affecting their ability to bear children. Besides, primitive races hardly ever suffer from the numerous diseases of the digestive tract which afflict us, bringing about invalidism and death.
Every prescriber, professional and lay, should study practical dietetics, guided by such men as Mac Carrison, Professor Plimmer and others. I have studied the writings of these men assiduously, and have quoted them in all my books, particularly in my book, ” Chronic Constipation–The Most Insidious and the most Deadly of Diseases.” It may appear to my readers a gross exaggeration to call chronic constipation the most insidious and the most deadly of diseases, but I think that I have proved that this is the fact in the volume mentioned.
Many diseases and disorders are produced by inflammatory conditions of are accompanied by inflammation. If a dog suffers from inflammation, an angry-looking skin rash, boils or ulcers, etc., the experienced vet. will immediately tell the owner: “Dont give him meat. Put him on a plain diet with bread and milk, etc., until he is well.” That is quite good advice, but ordinary doctors do not care to interfere with the diet of their patients. They wish to be popular and people do not like to have their diet altered.
I remember an illuminating case. A well-to-do business man told me that his wife was afflicted with horribly ulcerated legs which made movement impossible, that she had become enormously stout in consequence, and that she was visited every day by her doctor. On my enquiry he told me that her doctor treated her with an arsenic wash from the outside and with an arsenic-containing mixture from the inside. He had not altered her diet. The wretched woman ate between five and six eggs a day.
She had flesh, fish or fowl at every meal, she ate as much as a healthy navy, and concentrated on the most heating food. I explained to her husband that her condition was due to her amazing diet, that the heating and putrefactive food which she was taking was poisoning her blood, and that legs which discharged foulness from the body in the form of large quantities of pus. His wife was satisfied with her doctor and his treatment, and the husband explained to me that his wife would probably disregard my advice.
In the afternoon I saw one of the leading London specialists and I told him with indignation of the faulty treatment given to the woman by her doctor. He answered smilingly: “What else could the poor devil of a doctor do ? The woman enjoys gorging. She does not move. She sits and eats every day and all day long, and if the doctor would insist upon a simplified dietary or upon a complete abstinence from flesh, fish and fowl in every from, she would merely send him away and engage another doctor. We doctors have learned by experience that it is unwise to interfere with the food habits of our patients”.
I have found it not only decent, but advantageous to insist upon patients following that diet which I consider is demanded by their condition. It is true in number of cases I have been curtly dismissed, but I have acted in accordance with my conscience by insisting upon an alternation which I though absolutely necessary. I remember a certain prince making a scene because I had ordered his wife to leave off flesh, fish and fowl. I politely but firmly replied to the prince that if he wished to treat his wife he was welcome, but as long as I was treating her I could not allow interference with my directions.
A well-known and immensely wealthy nobleman had a swelling which looked cancerous. A prominent Harley Street specialist was treating him. The patient was not at all satisfied with his progress. One day he told him: “I wonder whether my trouble has something to do with diet ? Please give me a diet.” The specialist smilingly replied: “As far as I am concerned you eat anything you like except roast crocodile.” Lord Blank looked at him with indignation and sharply replied: “I have not called you in to make jokes but to give me helpful advice. Please bring Mr. Ellis Barker.” The eminent specialist wished to keep Lord Blank as a patient, and therefore approached me.
I prescribed a suitable fleshless and fishless diet, and in order to make sure that he would get palatable meals, went into the kitchen to interview the cook. His lordship kept a most wonderful cook who worked with a large staff of underlings. The cook did not like my ideas. She was used to producing the richest food. Lord Blank carried out my diet for two or three weeks, and then ordered behind my back the most unsuitable food. I discovered it, challenged him, but to my regret my patient refused to live on a vegetarian diet. I told him that I could no longer be responsible for his treatment. In a few months it became obvious that he was suffering from cancer, and in due course he died.
An immensely wealthy financier had undergone a big abdominal operation and the wound would not heal. As his doctors and surgeon had failed, he sent for me. In investigating his case it became clear to me that the putrefactive foods on which the financier lived had fouled his blood and prevented natural healing. I told him plainly that a reform of his diet was indispensable. He told me: ” I pay my cook L500 a year. All my friends have excellent cooks. We dine n one anothers houses every day. You cannot expect me to live on a simple diet.” He would not have treatment, and I departed expressing my regret at his giving a chance to himself or to me.
The financier was attended daily by a doctor, and occasionally specialists were called in. One day he sent for a heart specialist, and in the afternoon he met a friend of mine and told him: “I have been thoroughly overhauled by a great heart specialist. He spent about an hour in examining me, and at the end of the examination exclaimed, Why, you have a heart like a young man, like a youngster.
You are marvellous.” The financier was tremendously pleased and celebrated the occasion with champagne. Next morning the valet knocked at his masters door at the usual time and got no reply. He knocked a second and a third time, and then entered the room. the financier lay in bed. The doctor arrived and the death certificate stated that the financier had died of heart failure. That happened five or six months after interview with him. His big abdominal wound had never healed.
The conscientious doctor or lay prescriber should never strive to please his b playing the courtier. If a woman refuses to be examined, she should be told kindly but firmly that such and such an examination is necessary, and that if she is unwilling to be examined she had better see another doctor. If a patient desperately needs a very different diet, or an operation or a complete rest, or whatever may be needed, the doctor should insist and he should not only point out the danger of disobedience, but should add: ” I can no longer be responsible for you if you do not follow my advice.
As a conscientious man I must insist upon it. I cannot allow you to injure yourself or to endanger your life, and unless you what I find necessary for you, I must withdraw from the case.” In most cases the patient will fall in the doctors demand, and will have a much higher opinion of his adviser than he had had previously. A man who acts in this manner cannot be suspected of mercenary motives.
Speaking of mercenary motives reminds me that there is a well- known scandal in the medical profession. There are medical men who recommend an operation and have made arrangements with the surgeon whereby the fee obtained is shared between the surgeon and the doctor who suggested the operation. Such conduct seems to me outrageous. It induces doctors to recommend totally unnecessary operations, and to persuade their patients that they should pay an exorbitant fee for such operations.
There are not only arrangement between doctors and surgeons, as we have been told by Dr. Cronin in his book, The Citadel there are similar arrangements between doctors and dentists, doctors and X-ray workers, doctors and laboratory men, doctors and nursing homes, etc. If I find it necessary to recommend a patient to spend money on a surgical appliance or on seeing a specialist, I frequently mention that I am in no way financially interested. I think it is as well to mention this in order to avoid suspicion.
Most surgeons and specialists thank doctors for sending them patients. If I received such thanks I always say: ” If there is gratitude, it should not be on your part towards me who have sent you the patient. the gratitude is on my part because you have helped me to cure my patient.” The financial consideration should be a very secondary matter.
James Ellis Barker wrote a very large number of books, both under the name James Ellis Barker and under his real German name Otto Julius Eltzbacher, The Truth about Homœopathy; Rough Notes on Remedies with William Murray; Chronic Constipation; The Story of My Eyes; Miracles Of Healing and How They are Done; Good Health and Happiness; New Lives for Old: How to Cure the Incurable; My Testament of Healing; Cancer, the Surgeon and the Researcher; Cancer, how it is Caused, how it Can be Prevented with a foreward by William Arbuthnot Lane; Cancer and the Black Man etc.