During my pharmaceutical experience I was often sorely vexed as to what to do when prescriptions contained drugs which on mixing would undergo decomposition which the physician surely did not anticipate. I remember well a prescription directing that potassium permanganate be made into pills with extract of gentian and other things, and how, the physician having spurned the suggestion to modify the prescription so as to avoid decomposition of the permanganate, I was obliged to select a mortar, gently triturate the drugs until a conflagration was started, and to finish the prescription after the combustion had subsided. However, in my pharmaceutical experience I generally found the physician most ready to receive suggestions from the pharmacist which would prevent incompatibilities, improve the palatability and appearance of his prescriptions, and protect the patient from unnecessary expense.
Similarly it has been my experience since the establishment of the Association’s laboratory that physicians are anxious to receive information in regard to the materia medica, pharmacy and chemistry of drugs. As the druggist earns the respect and support of the physician when he makes available to him the pharmaceutical knowledge and experience which he has, so this laboratory has aimed to gain the endorsement of the American Medical Association membership by furnishing to physicians information in regard to the composition, chemistry and pharmacy of drugs through replies in the Query and Minor Notes Department of The Journal as well as through direct correspondence. It has been most gratifying to the laboratory that The Journal receives an increasing number of inquiries both as regards the chemical and pharmaceutical questions involved in the writing of prescriptions and as regards the composition of secret and semisecret proprietaries (often because they are prescribed by the inquirer’s colleague) and “patent medicines” (which are taken by his patient). The laboratory has tried its best to answer the many inquiries received. Many of the questions which come in can be answered by a pharmacist or chemist without hesitation. Others, particularly as to the composition of medicines, the laboratory has been able to answer by reference to its library and its extensive card index. Still others have required experimentation and chemical analysis.
While, as stated a moment ago, the laboratory has encouraged the sending of inquiries and has earnestly striven to furnish the information asked for, it is obvious that the amount of chemical work which can be done is limited. The small size of the laboratory force, consisting of three chemists engaged in actual analytical work, makes it necessary to select for investigation those problems which shall be of general interest to the medical profession. As the American Medical Association is national in its scope, the laboratory has held that it can do analytical work only when such work will be of general interest to physicians and of value both to the medical profession and the public. In view of this it has refrained from undertaking analyses which would benefit only the physician making the inquiry and possibly his patient. The laboratory further has not felt justified in undertaking work of merely local interest; instead it has used its endeavors to secure the investigation of such local problems by municipal or state authorities.—(From The Journal A. M. A., Nov. 25, 1916.)
LEAD IN “AKOZ”
Akoz is a mineral product sold by the Natura Company of San Francisco, and said to possess most remarkable medicinal properties.
A circular issued by the Natura Company begins thus:
“While scientists have been striving through the centuries to compound remedies for man’s various ills, Nature, greatest chemist of them all, has been working wonders in her crucibles and has achieved results far beyond man’s greatest expectation.”
“Nature’s chief handicap has been the difficulty of placing her gifts in the hands of those whom she would benefit. By accident or fate, as you will, one of Nature’s greatest medicinal products has just been discovered. It is the mineral given the name of Akoz by John D. Mackenzie, president and manager of the Natura Company of San Francisco, which is now giving this rare remedy of Nature to the public.”
The circular then describes how the power of the “rare remedy” to cure rheumatism is claimed to have been discovered and asserts that: