The specificity of cancer and the general principles of its treatment and prophylaxis : being an address delivered at a meeting of the East Yorks Division of the British Medical Association at Hull on March 18th, 1910 / by Alexander Theodore Brand.

  • Brand, Alexander Theodore, 1852-1934.
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The specificity of cancer and the general principles of its treatment and prophylaxis : being an address delivered at a meeting of the East Yorks Division of the British Medical Association at Hull on March 18th, 1910 / by Alexander Theodore Brand. 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.

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    THE THE GENERAL'PRINCIPLES OF ITS TREATMENT AND PROPHYLAXIS.1 A.NCER AND The treatment of disease is at all times beset with difficulty even when the cause is well known, and this difficulty is greatly enhanced in the case of maladies whose cause is still undetermined. In the latter class treatment can be only empiric. The cause of cancer has not, so far, been proved to demonstration, and unfortunately no remedy of any kind, even empiric, has been discovered ; but though the cause has not yet been demonstrated by the production of the originating agent (and such is not remarkable since we are merely on the threshold of the knowledge of the causa- tion of specific disease), still it is logically deducible from the well-known facts relating to the disease. No disease more plainly bears upon itself the impress of specificity than cancer ; indeed, this is one of its chief charac- teristics. Its constant primary local origin in practically any situation ; its invariable extension by auto-infection, evidenced by its widespread dissemination by metastasis ; its constant relation to a “condition precedent”;1 the innumerable so- called “ coincidences ” which clearly point to what would, in any other diseased condition, be considered infection ; and the countless successful inoculations which have been made, 1 The “condition precedent” is a term introduced to indicate that state of vulnerability which must exist before an individual can be successfully attacked by the cancer parasite. It is induced by degenera- tion of tissue from any cause, more especially from obsolescence of organs, senescence, and senility, chronic disease, continued irritation, traumatism, and by congenital susceptibility.—A. T. B,