LIQUID ALBOLENE
Report of the Council on Pharmacy and Chemistry
As now marketed, Liquid Albolene (McKesson and Robbins, New York), is claimed to be made only from genuine Russian oil and hence to possess distinct advantages over
“... Oils purporting to be Russian, most of which are imperfectly purified and many of which are positively dangerous for continued use.”
On the other hand, a short time ago, McKesson and Robbins claimed that Liquid Albolene was then available.
“... Of as high a quality as we had supplied before the European War. Thanks to the research and scientific achievement of Our Chemists, we are now able to offer LIQUID ALBOLENE, using as a base a specially refined Domestic Oil that is in every way suitable for medicinal purposes, and having the same viscosity as Russian Oil.”
The advertising matter suggests the promiscuous, thoughtless and irrational use of Liquid Albolene and of a number of Albolene preparations by extravagant claims, such, for example, as the following:
“Albolene will never fail to bring a free, easy stool, no matter what condition may be present, from obstinate atony of the bowel to fissure, fistula, or even malignant disease, and in spite of the failure of ordinary purgatives to which the patient may have become habituated....
“Aromatic Liquid Albolene is actually the first laxative presented to the medical profession that seems to have no drawback....
“It will not have been lost upon the physician who has read the remarks on the use of Aromatic Liquid Albolene to regulate the bowels in surgical cases, that there are many instances where it would prove equally valuable during the treatment of acute diseases. In the exanthemata, in pneumonia, for example, to cite only a few of the conditions where it may be used to advantage, an absolutely reliable laxative that will not in any way weaken or distress the patient, presents obvious superiority to any of the agents heretofore in common use.”
The Council held Liquid Albolene ineligible because the product is marketed in a way to encourage its indiscriminate and irrational use by the public (Rule 4) and because unwarranted therapeutic claims are made for it (Rule 6).—(From Reports of Council on Pharmacy and Chemistry, 1916, p. 65.)