The prescription of proprietary medicines for the sick : its demoralizing effects on the medical profession.

  • Lindsley, Charles A. (Charles Augustus), 1826-1906.
Date:
[1882?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The prescription of proprietary medicines for the sick : its demoralizing effects on the medical profession. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    — 5 — by men apparently holding responsible positions as teachers of medicine. Yes, indeed, teachers! their titles seem to indicate that they are teachers / Mirabile dictu ! teachers of medicine ! Heaven help their students, and their future patients, if this is the sort of thera- peutics taught in the colleges these professors represent. BROMIDIA. Bromidia is the hypnotic par excellence. It produces refreshing sleep, and is ex- ceedingly valuable in sleeplessness, nervousness, neuralgia, headache, convulsions, colics, etc., and will relieve when opiates fail. Unlike preparations of opium, it does not lock up the secretions. In the restlessness and delirium of fevers, it is absolutely invaluable. The following phvsicians, having tested bromidia, recommend it to the profession: J. K. Bauduy, A.M., LL.D.. St. Louis, Mo., Professor Nervous and Mental Diseases, Missouri Medical College. L. Ch. Boisliniere, M.D., LL.D.. St. Louis; Prof, of Obstetrics and Diseases of Wo- men, St. Louis Medical College. Wm. B. Hazard, M.D., St. Louis, Mo.; Prof, of General Pathology and Mental and Nervous Diseases, St. Louis College of Physicians and Surgeons. J. S. Jewell, A.M., M.D., Chicago, 111.; Ed. Journal Mental and Nervous Diseases, and Prof, of Nervous and Mental Diseases, Chicago Medical College. H. M. Lyman, A.M., M.D., Chicago, 111.; Prof, of Physiology and Diseases of the Nervous System, Rush Medical College. D. R. Brower, M.D., Chicago, 111,; Ed. Chicago Medical Journal and Examiner, and Professor of Nervous and Mental Diseases, etc.. Woman's Medical College. I. N. Danforth, M.D., Chicago, 111.; Professor of Pathology and Diseases of the Kid- neys, Woman's Hospital Medical College; President and Lecturer on Pathology, Spring Faculty, Rush Medic U College. D. D. Bramble, M.D., Cincinnati, O.; Dean; Prof, of Principles and Practice of Surgery and Clinical Surgery, Cin. Col. of Medicine and Surgery. Wm. Clendenin, M.D., Cincinnati, O.; Prof, of Descriptive and Surg. Anatomy, Miami Medical College. . J. B. Marvin, M.D., Louisville, Ky.; Prof, of Chemistry, etc., and Clinical Lecturer on Nervous Dit eases, Hospital College of Medicine. W. B. Fletcher, M.D., Indianapolis, lnd.; Professor of Physiology, Hygiene and Clinical Medicine, Medical College of Indiana. W. J. Scott, M.D., Cleveland, O.; Professor of Principles and Practice of Medicine, Medical Department Wdoster University. H. H. Powell, M.D., Cleveland, O.; Professor of Obstetrics and Diseases of Children, Cleveland Medical College. Then, too, our offices are daily beset with polite, well-dressed and loquacious emissaries, coming laden with samples of their productions, which they beg us to test the merits of, upon our poor patients. How exactly like the way in which pain-killers» and all healing ointments are politely presented to the clerical profession, who in return readily publish certificates of the astonishing virtues they find in them. Human credulity is about the same in all ranks and stations of life. But it is very humiliating to know that boastful pietensions, constantly, persistently, and boldly re- asserted should make dupes of doctors almost as easily as of their patients. This may seem verv strong language. But I appeal to your own experience and knowledge of facts to tell me'upon what other foundations rest the wide and general use of proprietary medicines than the boastful advertisements in which they are wrapped. Tell me, if you can, which of the standard authorities in therapeutics advocates the use of these peculiar forms of the materia medica. Not any. I state it boldly, as my sincere conviction, that the extensive sale of proprietary medicines is secured through the prescriptions of medical men, by pre- cisely the same system of persistent, boastful advertisements and certificates, applied to our profession that secures the sale ot Vegetable Liver Pills and Hop Bitters, and all such trash, to the general public. Where else do we learn of these things except through the ad- vertisements? One illustration will suffice to enforce the truth of this statement. Scarcely any of the proprietary medicines have found more favor with our profession than the syrup of the hypophosphites of soda, lime and potash. So extensively has it been prescribed especially for tubercular diseases, that almost all the makers of ready-made medicinal 'compounds have found it profitable to engage in the manufacture and sale of this p™P?™^l™'more than tWenty years since Dr. J. F. Churchill announced to the Imperial