| Amount Claimed | Amount Found | |||
| “Syrup Iron Iodid, U. S. P.” | ||||
Ferrous Iodid | 10% | 4.6% | ||
| “Acetanilid and Sodium Bromid Tablets” | ||||
Acetanilid | 3.50 | gr. | 2.94 | gr. |
| “Anti-Vomit Tablets” | ||||
Bismuth subnitrate | 2.50 | gr. | 1.76 | gr. |
Cerium Oxalate | 2.50 | gr. | 1.78 | gr. |
Cocain Hydrochl. | 0.0833 | gr. | 0.0637 | gr. |
“Aspirin Tablets” | 5.0 | gr. | 3.82 | gr. |
| “Bismuth and Calomel Comp. Tablets” | ||||
Bismuth subnitrate | 0.1 | gr. | 0.22 | gr. |
Calomel | 0.1 | gr. | 0.22 | gr. |
| “Quinin Laxative Tablets” | ||||
Acetanilid | 2.0 | gr. | 1.69 | gr. |
“Salol Tablets” | 2.50 | gr. | 2.05 | gr. |
“Sodium Calicylate Tablets” | 5.0 | gr. | 3.88 | gr. |
| “Neuralgic Pills” | ||||
Morphin sulphate | 0.05 | gr. | 0.015 | gr. |
| “Diarrhea Calomel Pills” | ||||
Morphin sulphate | 0.062 | gr. | 0.05 | gr. |
“Morphin Sulphate Hypodermic Tablets” | 0.25 | gr. | 0.21 | gr. |
“Aspirin Tablets” | 5.00 | gr. | 1.13 | gr. |
—(From The Journal A. M. A., Oct. 18, 1919.)
YEAST
From time to time yeast has attained a transitory popularity as a therapeutic agent. Its use in this way in practical medicine has been based essentially on empiric considerations. Yeast is rich in nucleic acid, but this has not found any special applications. The fatlike substances obtainable from yeast have been recommended in certain alimentary conditions, without finding any widespread acceptance.
More recently yeast has acquired interest from somewhat different angles. In these days of food shortage and enforced conservation, it has come to be realized that the minute yeast cells are endowed with a remarkable capacity of synthesizing one of the most valued nutrients, namely, protein. This substance can be built up out of the simplest forms of nitrogenous compounds by yeasts, in contrast with the incapacity of the higher organisms to construct protein out of anything less complex than the ready made aminoacids. It is reported that in Europe yeast has actually been grown on a large scale in solutions of sugar, salt and simple nitrogenous compounds for the sake of securing the much desired proteins. The utilization of yeast protein for cattle feeding is a current practice abroad; and the satisfactory digestibility and availability of the same product by the human organism has repeatedly been announced since the beginning of the war. In this country the yeast which is produced as a by-product of the brewing industry is for the most part discarded as waste; in the distilleries it becomes a part of the distillers’ grains that are extensively employed as feeds in the dairy industry.
Still newer is the indication that yeast is comparatively rich in at least one of the as yet unidentified accessory factors in nutrition now popularly spoken of as vitamins. Hopkins of the University of Cambridge, England, first directed attention to this unique property of yeast. It has been verified by Funk and Macallum, and recently Osborne and Mendel have given substantial evidence of the potency of yeast to render a diet not otherwise capable of inducing maintenance effective in nutrition.
Yeast has been used, like extracts of rice polishings, to cure the experimental polyneuritis induced in birds by a diet of polished rice. From the experiments of Osborne and Mendel it appears that less than 2 per cent. of dried brewers’ yeast suffices to induce small experimental animals to grow on artificial food mixtures on which alone they fail to thrive. How the use of yeast as an adjuvant to otherwise inadequate food mixtures exerts its beneficial effect is not yet made clear. Satisfactory growth in these cases is promoted by liberal eating. Anything which renders food more palatable may stimulate one to eat more liberally of it. This can scarcely be the explanation of the potency of the yeast as it is effective even when fed apart from the rest of the food. It may have a favorable effect on the metabolism and thus improve the general condition so that more food is consumed. Small quantities of milk and extracts of many of the common plant foods, such as the cereal grains, have been found to act in the same way. There seems to be little doubt, therefore, that yeast also contains something comparable with the so-called water-soluble vitamins of the diet. A specific need for yeast can scarcely be predicated on this fact, however; for any well selected human dietary containing the usual variety of animal and vegetable foods is not likely to be devoid of the widely distributed water-soluble type of vitamin. We mention this to check premature enthusiasm for a new vitamin.—(Editorial from The Journal A. M. A., Sept. 8, 1917.)