THE RUSSELL EMULSION AND THE RUSSELL PREPARED GREEN BONE
Report of the Council on Pharmacy and Chemistry
The following report on “The Russell Emulsion” and “The Russell Prepared Green Bone,” marketed by the Standard Emulsion Company, was submitted to the Council by a referee. The Council endorsed the report and authorized its publication.
W. A. Puckner, Secretary.
The Russell Emulsion is put up in a neat package and advertised in an attractive pamphlet, on the cover of which we are told: “Truth Always Justifies The Superlative Degree.” As what follows in the booklet and in the printed circulars certainly does not lack superlatives, this is doubtless a warning.
In addition to the pamphlet and circular advertising, the product seems to be systematically boomed by a lecture scheme in which one Dr. Hague talks before medical societies and distributes advertising matter. The lecture is succeeded by a follow-up letter scheme through which matter is sent to members of the society. Hague ostensibly discusses “lime starvation in tuberculosis,” but medical societies soon learned to estimate his work as essentially to advertise the Russell products. Last April the Medical Society of the State of Pennsylvania sent out a circular letter to its county organizations on the subject of the Russell-Hague propaganda which opens in this way:
“You have doubtless received a letter from Dr. William Grant Hague of New York, offering to address your county society on Tuberculosis. After due investigation, it is respectfully suggested that it may not be desirable to ask him to address your society....”
The statements in the pamphlet and circular published are typical of the whole method of exploitation. For example, can such claims as these be surpassed by the veriest quack?
“Science cannot improve the means employed in producing The Russell Emulsion.”
“Genius has not devised better methods than are used in manufacturing The Russell Emulsion.”
“Money cannot buy better products than are used in The Russell Emulsion.”
“Experience cannot suggest a more nutritious combination of fats than we use in The Russell Emulsion.”
The emulsion is said to be made of equal parts of beef-fat, coconut, peanut and cottonseed oils, held in suspension by albumin. The latter we are told is applied to each globule of the emulsion by an “elaborate technical process” devised by Dr. Russell. The mixture is everywhere spoken of as a “physiological” emulsion, but the word is always in quotation marks. Why it is called “physiological” is not clear, but the term may be counted on to impress the unthinking or the unscientific.
Numerous false and exaggerated statements are made about this “physiological” emulsion with reference to food value. For instance:
“The nutritional value of fats differ; the nutritional value of these fats and their increased efficiency by combination over all others have been determined by extensive clinical observation.”
And also:
“The Russell Emulsion is approximated in food value by no other emulsion or food product in existence.”
“A ‘physiological’ emulsion is a predigested food. It is absorbed with little assistance from the digestive juices, and with no waste of energy. It is, therefore, the ideal food ...”
These are sample statements found in the pamphlet and accompanying circular. A dozen or more pathologic conditions are mentioned in which this “ideal food” is specifically indicated; but we find, also, this curious statement: “Patients can rarely take this dose [speaking of the maximum dose of 2 ounces night and morning] for more than three or four weeks without showing symptoms of over-feeding.” This unguarded remark about an ingestion of 48 grams of fat daily prompts one to ask what is wrong with the “ideal predigested food.”
Russell is wedded to the idea that “lime starvation” is the main factor in tuberculosis, and insists on the importance of large amounts of fat for the “lime starved.”
“Dr. Russell was the original interpreter of the Lime Starved State and originated The Lime Starvation Treatment in Tuberculosis. He also first pointed out and emphasized the therapeutic importance of regarding the combination of lime phosphate and casein, as brought down by the rennet enzyme, as a chemical union.”
This overworked lime-starvation theory certainly lacks any tangible confirmation (see in this connection a recent paper by Halverson, Mohler and Bergeim, in The Journal, May 5, 1917), and to urge it to promote the sale of a fat preparation is preposterous. On the uninitiated the exaggerated pseudo-scientific language of the pamphlet and circular advertisement will probably make some impression. Unfortunately such things count not only with the layman who, having no technical knowledge of physiology, cannot be expected to weigh the evidence but also with those medical men who, while scientifically educated, are influenced by unscientific claims when plausibly presented. The pamphlet is a striking example of a style which is dangerous because it smacks of science.
The Russell Company sells also a mixture called “Prepared Green Bone,” said to be made by partially digesting ground chicken bones with hydrochloric acid and pepsin and adding glycerin at the end of the digestion. The product is a sticky, unappetizing looking mass, put up in little earthenware boxes and advertised as a lime food, apparently to go along with the fat emulsion. The greater value of a few glasses of milk daily is evidently overlooked.
“The Russell Emulsion” and “The Prepared Green Bone” were declared inadmissible to New and Nonofficial Remedies.
[Editorial Comment.—There are always those who are ready to exploit the unfortunate tuberculous. It is, unfortunately, a fact that many physicians accept as true, statements clothed with obscure and voluminous quasi-scientific verbiage. Such men would laugh at the bald claim that the moon is made of green cheese; when, however, one plausibly and with due solemnity, affirms that the nocturnal luminous earthly satellite is composed of an infinite aggregation of molecules of bewildering and awe-compelling complexity, built up from the recently discovered polypeptids, the whole being of a verdant tint, the person addressed looks impressed and opines that it sounds reasonable! The advertising for The Russell Emulsion and The Russell Prepared Green Bone is dangerous because it appeals to the thoughtless—layman and physician, alike.]—(From The Journal A. M. A., June 23, 1917.)