The problems of cancer / by Ernest Bashford.

  • Bashford, E. F. (Ernest Francis), 1873-
Date:
[1903?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The problems of cancer / by Ernest Bashford. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    contributed much to the hypothetical discussions of the nature of cancer. It would seem to be advisable to endeavour to interchange the disproportions existing between the fields from which the facts and the theories of cancer have been drawn, so that instead of speculations from many fields being founded, as at present, upon the few facts of cancer ascertained from its occurrence among the more educated ot mankind, facts from a very extensive biological inquiry, embracing not only all races of men, but, so far as possible, the entire animal kingdom, will be focussed upon the condition which is of so much interest to us at present. Probably in the disproportions of the fields from which the .theories and the facts of cancer have been drawn is to be found the explanation of the standstill to which cancer investigation has come since Virchow’s classical work has been followed to its logical results. In this dispro¬ portion we have possibly also the cause of the prominence obtained by views, which, had the facts of cancer been founded upon a wider basis, would never have had devoted to their attempted establishment the amount of labour which has been conferred upon them. On the other hand, the apparent hopelessness of endeavouring to elucidate the problems of malignant new growths would not have been magnified to such an extent had this disproportion not existed. Obviously, it behoves those devoting attention to the problems of cancer to endeavour to adjust the inequality, which has been pointed out, in the hope that when the facts of cancer as a general and com¬ parative biological problem, as distinct from a problem of human pathology only, have been placed upon a basis commensurate with the extent of its ramifications in man and animals, the pessimism now prevailing, not without justification, will, with the attainment of this adjustment, disappear. In amplification of what is implied by endeavouring to regard cancer not merely as a problem of human pathological anatomy, but as a problem of much greater extent, some matters may be alluded to which, if of a speculative nature, seem to indicate the importance of regarding cancer from the standpoint of a comparative biological problem, even at this early stage. The following aspects of some probloms associated with the study of cancer are referred to in the hope that the attention of those having- opportunity of making observations may be directed to them.