CAMPHO-PHENIQUE
Appealing to the New Fledged Graduate.
The secretary of the Harvard University Medical School received from the Campho-Phenique Company of St. Louis a letter that, presumably, has been sent to most of the medical colleges of the country. It read:
“We wish to supply the senior class of all Medical Colleges with physicians’ samples of Campho-Phenique Liquid and Campho-Phenique Powder, and Ointment for 1918.
“We will thank you very kindly if you will send us a communication stating the number of students in your graduating class, and if possible, we would like the name of each and every student, that we may send him personally a sample of Campho-Phenique. In this way, we are sure the party receives the sample.”
Presumably, the Campho-Phenique concern believes in following the old advice: Catch ’em young! In this connection, it may be well briefly to call to the attention of fourth-year medical students the results of the investigation of the Council on Pharmacy and Chemistry of Campho-Phenique. The Council’s findings on Campho-Phenique Liquid were to the effect that the preparation, which was exploited under a false “formula,” was, essentially, a solution of camphor and phenol in liquid petrolatum, substances well known in medicine and none of which under its own name has been credited with possessing any superlative virtues. The Council’s verdict on Campho-Phenique Powder was that “for all practical purposes it is essentially a camphorated talcum powder” containing, apparently, sufficient camphor and phenol to give the talcum powder an odor. It was further brought out in the Council’s report that the Campho-Phenique Company was in effect one of the numerous trade names adopted by one James F. Ballard of St. Louis. Mr. Ballard seems to market a number of “patent medicines,” most of them sold direct to the public, but some, as in the case of Campho-Phenique, exploited to the public via the medical profession. “Herbine,” a “marvelous preparation” that “puts the liver in healthy condition”; “Ballard’s Snow Liniment” that when applied to wounds performs “a perfect cure that leaves no scar”; “Dr. T. L. Stephens’ Chemical Eye Salve” which “acts quickly in all cases” and cures “failing vision,” are some of the numerous “patent medicines” made and sold by Ballard. “Collins Ague Remedy,” “Swaim’s Panacea,” “Swayne’s Panacea” and “Renne’s Pain Killing Oil” are four more of Mr. Ballard’s products, for each of which he has pleaded guilty in the federal courts to making false and fraudulent claims knowingly and wantonly.
If medical colleges of the better class were turning out graduates today who could be caught by free samples of such nostrums as Campho-Phenique, then, indeed, would the outlook for the future of scientific medicine be a gloomy one. But they are not. The young man or woman who goes out today from a reputable medical college is imbued with the scientific spirit, has developed habits of straight thinking and will not, we believe, be so uncritical as to accept at their face value claims made for nostrums of the Campho-Phenique type.—(From The Journal A. M. A., Feb. 9, 1918.)