On the nature, action, and therapeutic value of the active principles of tuberculin : an investigation / by William Hunter.

  • Hunter, William, 1861-1937.
Date:
1891
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the nature, action, and therapeutic value of the active principles of tuberculin : an investigation / by William Hunter. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    19/43 (page 17)
    2. Alkaloidal substances; two of which can be obtained in the form of the platinum compounds of their hydro- chlorate salts. 3. Extractives; small in quantity, and of unrecognized nature. 4. Mucin. 5. Inorganic salts. 6. Glycerine and colouring matter. So far as my observations go, the following substances are absent from tuberculin, namely, serum albumin, glo- bulin, peptones. II. ACTION. The result of my chemical investigations was thus to show that the only substances present in tuberculin with which its active properties could be connected were albu- moses, organic bases of alkaloidal nature, and probably various extractives. My next object, therefore, was to ascertain to which of these bodies, or groups of bodies, tuberculin owed its characteristic properties, remedial and otherwise. Observations to this end were made in the first instance on animals—mice and guinea-pigs. Having in this way satisfied myself that the various modifications of tuberculin I had prepared were physiologically active— that their active properties had not been destroyed by the methods I had employed in preparing them—I suggested to Professor Watson Cheyne that the results I had obtained might be utilised in the treatment of tuberculous patients. He agreed to this suggestion, and since the end of April has carried out treatment with this modified tuberculin in King’s College Hospital and in Paddington Green Children’s Hospital, using it in place of the parent material—tuberculin. The patients treated have up to the present time been comparatively few in number, and have been mostly cases