ACCESSORY TREATMENT.
This, whilst not strictly part of my subject, would leave the matter incomplete if I did not mention it.
It includes:-
General Hygiene.
Suitable Diet.
Corrected Breathing.-Imperfect oxidation is a common factor in disease. It is brought about by modern habits, which take so much nervous energy in other directions that the vital functions of the body tend to suffer. The act of breathing itself is, in consequence, apt to become shallow as a habit.
Skin Treatment.-The proper use of air, water, and friction is very valuable.
Electrical of all kinds, including the oscilloclast.
Osteopathy and chiropractic.-Whilst the claims made for these methods of treatment are unquestionably exaggerated, they have a very important part to play in certain cases, especially where the spine is subluxated.
Mental and Moral.-The importance of these helps is not yet sufficiently realized. They depend partly upon the personality of the doctor, and therefore his influence upon the patient; and partly upon the mental and moral outlook of the patient.
Corrected Habits.-It need not be said how important these are.
CONCLUSION.
The subject we have been dealing with, especially the malignant tumours, forms one of the greatest problems of medicine in our time. From what I have said it will be apparent that I regard the future with great hope, as from being haphazard one’s results are becoming more certain. The right direction seems to be the dealing with the patient as a whole, and not with the tumours themselves primarily, as they are the outcome of an abnormal condition of the system. I hope, ere I die, to be able to prove to myself and others that cancer is not the incurable disease is only incurable when it has made the conditions of life impossible. Short of that, a disease is only incurable when we do not know how to cure it. The laws of life are beneficent in their action when we rightly use them, and it is a glorious mission to be able to lessen the suffering of our fellow-man and to diminish the amount of heart-break and disability associated with malignant disease. The highest and noblest of our powers are here called into play.
We are told, and have proved, that those who ask, receive; those who seek, find; and to those who knock, the door shall be opened. Let us ask largely, let us seek earnestly, and the door to knowledge, hope and happiness, for ourselves and others, shall be opened.
DISCUSSION.
Dr. SUTHERLAND said he had not previously received such encouragement concerning the treatment of cancer as he had received that morning. There was an overwhelming opinion in his country that there was one thing to do, and one thing only, in cases of cancer-and that was to operate, and to operate early. There was only one type of which he knew of malignant disease which was curable by operation, and that was superficial epithelioma. That sometimes, when sufficiently removed, might not and did not return in the majority of cases. That was being treated to-day where he lived, by radium. That reminded him of a case which he had had 25 years ago-a case of facial epithelioma. At that time there was a great deal said about X-rays. As he had not had sufficient acquaintance with the healing power of the homoeopathically applied drug to advise the patient that she had better be deprived of the benefit of X-rays, he suggested X-rays, but the patient would not have it. Within two or three years she came with a facial erysipelas, typical in its nature, spreading over the entire face. When she got over that there was no epithelioma. He had since then wished that he could give his cases erysipelas in order to try it out. Radium was the nearest approach to that of which he knew, because radium did produce a dermatitis not unlike erysipelas. The sequel to the case had disheartened him very much indeed, however. The patient was an elderly woman, and about seven years after that she developed trouble with the label of the ear. He did not get to know anything about it for a few months, and then there was some considerable ulceration. The lymphatics were involved. It seemed unwise to submit the patient to operation, and the disease went on to deep ulceration, until finally she lost the ear. The ulceration involved a large part of the neck, and as a result she died of exhaustion.
He had had several cases of recurrence. One was that of a woman he had known for 30 years. Her father had died of carcinoma of the right inferior maxilla. That was the only case in which he had been able to trace any sort of hereditary influence of malignant disease. She had gone on very well indeed until she reached 45 or 50, when she developed a mammary tumour. Under the advice of several physicians and surgeons whom she had seen, she had subjected herself to operation, and the breast had been thoroughly removed, and the axillary glands also. At the same time, post-operatively, she had a serum used, which he always felt hurt her, and he thought so to-day.
It had been made from a serum obtained from rats, guineapigs, and so forth, from cases which seemed to be cases of cancer. For several years the patient seemed to be in excellent condition. She gained in weight; her appearance was good and the nutrition apparently was excellent as far as weight was concerned. Suddenly she had developed a lot of distress in the abdomen. He found the abdomen full of hard nodulated lumps. It was a case not exactly of recurrence but of new growth, such as Dr. Patrick had referred to in his paper. There were several other such cases of which he could speak. He had had cases of mammary tumour which had been removed. Under histological examination they had been classified as malignant, and in several such cases the patient had gone along for 15 or 17 years.
Dr. Compston had spoken of not having had any emergency cases in his practice for some few years. He wondered what Dr. Compston would do in the following case. The Monday before he left home he had been called to see a case, six or seven miles out of the city, of a patient who was suffering intense abdominal pain, which suggested either gall-stone colic or appendicitis, or renal colic. The pain was high up on the right side. It looked like gall-bladder, but on examining the case a tumour was found in the right groin. It had never been there before. He had examined the patient for abdominal trouble eight months ago, and he had not found and tumour then. The patient said it was absolutely new. She had not felt it until that evening. There was a bunch there as big as his fist. It seemed like a strangulated hernia. By use of position and gentle manipulation he was not able to reduce it all, and he advised an operation. Within an hour the patient was operated upon and a strangulation was found, and six or seven inches of intestinal tract had gone gangrenous. A decision was made, and he heard that the patient go for very long she would now have been buried. That was a type of emergency case.
A good deal had been said about nutrition, and something had been said about faulty elimination and diet. The tendency in America to-day was on the line of prevention. People were being advised to undergo thorough physical examination at least once a year. One of the big insurance companies had taken the matter up and had suggested an examination on every birthday. That idea was becoming rather popular, and he thought perhaps some good might be done by it. In the way of examination, he would suggest very careful quantitative urinary analysis.
A thorough blood examination was also of service-not once in a lifetime, but once in two or three years. One other type of examination he would urge was that which was called basal metabolism tests. By making such tests practitioners were able to tell what conditions the endocrine glands were in thyroid, adrenal, and the pituitary.
With regard to diet, in his estimation food was the most important thing on the face of this each as far as the body itself was concerned. It was well known that the body was made of what of what we ate. Every girl he had met had acquiesced in the idea that she could not make a silk dress out of a piece of flannel or wool; she must have silk. Yet humanity was trying to make silken bodies out of flannel food. Our diet was the one thing which needed reconstruction.
Dr. COMPSTON, referring to emergency cases, said he had not stated that he never would have emergency cases. All he was implying was that he believed that under proper constitutional treatment emergencies were much less likely to occur. With regard to annual examination, it all depended on who did the examination as to what the value of it would be.
