WHAT IS LIQUID PETROLATUM?
The use of liquid petrolatum in chronic constipation, which has recently become the vogue, has naturally been commercialized; as a result, also naturally, claims of superiority of one brand over another have been made. Some of these claims may have been well founded; others certainly are not. Some have claimed superiority for those products made from Russian oil over those made from American oils. As naphthene hydrocarbons predominate in Russian crude petroleums, and paraffin hydrocarbons in many or most American crude petroleums, it was assumed that the petrolatums derived from these sources differed from one another in like manner. Both the naphthenes and the paraffins are chemically inert; but some unexplained therapeutic superiority has been assumed to reside in the naphthenes. Consequently, it has been urged that the American liquid petrolatums should not be used internally. So far these claims and counterclaims have been based on much theory and little fact. The Journal publishes this week a contribution by Benjamin T. Brooks, Senior Fellow in charge of petroleum investigations at Mellon Institute, Pittsburgh. Brooks calls attention to the fact that Marcusson, in 1913, pointed out that most of the so-called “mineral oils” used for therapeutic purposes contain no paraffin hydrocarbons whatever; that they consist solely of naphthenes and polynaphthenes. Brooks confirms this statement so far as American liquid petrolatums are concerned. He states that many American petroleums, such as most of those from the Gulf region, are like the Russian in containing no paraffin; and that, in the case of those petroleums that do contain it, the customary refinery method of removing paraffin is sufficient to produce true naphthene and polynaphthene petrolatums. “The claim that only Russian oils belong in this class,” he says, “has no basis in fact and has been advanced presumably for business reasons.” The name “paraffin oil” applied to these liquid petrolatums, then, is a misnomer. The new name, “white naphthene oils,” suggested by Brooks, seems superfluous, however, since the pharmacopeial title, “liquid petrolatum,” is subject to no such objection.—(Editorial from The Journal A. M. A., Jan. 1, 1916.)