Therapeutics
The general article Therapeutics (Vol. 26, p. 793), by Dr. Sir Lauder Brunton, consulting physician to St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, London, author of Modern Therapeutics, etc., not only discusses both rational and empirical therapeutics, but, taking up the different parts of the body considers in detail the therapeutic measures most commonly employed in the treatment of disease. The subjects of Electrotherapeutics (Vol. 9, p. 249); Baths (Vol. 3, p. 514); Balneotherapeutics (Vol. 3, p. 284); Hydropathy (Vol. 14, p. 165); Aerotherapeutics (Vol. 1, p. 270); Massage (Vol. 17, p. 863) and X-Ray Treatment (Vol. 28, p. 887) have separate articles devoted to them. The last is by Dr. H. L. Jones, clinical lecturer on medical electricity at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, London.
In connection with the subject of therapeutics, mention must be made of Pharmacology (Vol. 21, p. 347), by Professor Stockman of the University of Glasgow, in which will be found an interesting history of drugs, and a classification into 28 groups with a description of the effect of each remedy. To this valuable material Dr. H. L. Hennessy has added a section, Terminology in Therapeutics (p. 352)—a general explanation of the common names used in the classification of drugs. The list at the end of this chapter indicates the separate articles on drugs and on materials from which the principal drugs are obtained.
Surgery
Dr. Charles Creighton of King’s College, Cambridge, writes on the history of Surgery (Vol. 26, p. 125) and the famous English Surgeon, Dr. Edmund Owen the section Modern Practice of Surgery (p. 129) in which are discussed antiseptic and aseptic surgery, drainage tubes, bloodless operations, Röntgen rays, use of radium, etc. The article Surgical Instruments and Appliances (Vol. 26, p. 132) is fully illustrated. Dr. Owen also contributes articles on the surgery of the different organs, the article Bone, Diseases and Injuries (Vol. 4, p. 200) and many accounts of diseases and disorders that come within the province of the surgeon, such as Appendicitis (Vol. 2, p. 217); Peritonitis (Vol. 21, p. 171); Hernia (Vol. 13, p. 372); Fistula (Vol. 10, p. 438); Varicose Veins (Vol. 27, p. 920), and Haemorrhoids (Vol. 12, p. 805). Sir Alexander R. Simpson, emeritus professor of midwifery and the diseases of women and children, University of Edinburgh, writes on Obstetrics (Vol. 19, p. 962); Dr. Louis Courtauld, formerly research scholar, Middlesex Hospital Cancer Laboratories, on Tumour (Vol. 27, p. 370); Dr. Arthur Shadwell, of the Epidemiological Society, on Cancer, with a special account of cancer research; and H. C. Crouch, teacher of anaesthetics at St. Thomas’s Hospital, London, on Anaesthesia and Anaesthetics (Vol. 1, p. 907).
Medical Biographies
A most interesting, unusual and instructive course of reading on the history and development of medicine may be based on the biographical articles alone. In Aesculapius (Vol. 1, p. 276) we learn how the gods of Greece effected cures. The life story of Hippocrates (Vol. 13, p. 518) is worthy of note, for the “medical art as we now practice it, the character of the physician as we now understand it,” both date from him. For information about the theory that disease originated from an irregular or inharmonious motion of the body corpuscles we turn to Asclepiades (Vol. 2, p. 722). An account of the man “out of whom the greater part of medicine has flowed” is found in Galen (Vol. 11, p. 398). The biography of the great Arab physician and philosopher Avicenna (Vol. 3, p. 62) should not be overlooked, nor the story of the revolt of Paracelsus (Vol. 20, p. 749). Important and interesting, too, are the biographies of Harvey, William (Vol. 13, p. 42); Sydenham, Thomas (Vol. 26, p. 277), the father of English medicine, and Haller, A. von (Vol. 12, p. 855), whose work marks the beginning of modern physiology. The work of Morgagni (Vol. 18, p. 831) in pathological anatomy marks an epoch in medicine, and the description in Cullen, William (Vol. 7, p. 616) of his new doctrine of “irritability” possesses a distinct interest. The accounts of Jenner, Edward (Vol. 15, p. 319), Hunter, John (Vol. 13, p. 939) and Hahnemann, S.C.F. (Vol. 12, p. 819) describe momentous events in the history of medicine at the close of the 18th century, while among the great names of the 19th will be found the chemist Pasteur (Vol. 20, p. 892), Koch, Robert (Vol. 15, p. 885), Lister (Vol. 16, p. 777) and Virchow, Rudolf (Vol. 28, p. 110).
The Allied Sciences
It has already been noted that the Britannica will prove an invaluable help to medical specialists in fields of knowledge other than their own. The regret is often expressed by physicians that it is not easy for them to study subjects outside their profession, even when these are closely connected with their work. It is, unfortunately, only too true, that material for such study is not readily available. But with so complete a work of reference at his disposal, and with its highly authentic information skillfully compressed into reasonable space, the medical man now enjoys a magnificent opportunity to obtain a full acquaintance with many subjects that he knows will assist him in the work.
It would be impossible to name all the articles here, but the alphabetical list at the end of this chapter includes them, and the attention of the physician and surgeon is directed to Bacteriology (Vol. 3, p. 156), by the late Prof. H. M. Ward of Cambridge and Prof. V. H. Blackman of the University of Leeds, and especially the section Pathological Importance (p. 171), which Prof. Robert Muir of Glasgow University has written; Biology (Vol. 3, p. 954), a classic article by the late Professor Huxley, revised and brought up-to-date by Dr. P. Chalmers Mitchell; Heredity (Vol. 13, p. 350), also by Dr. Mitchell; Mendelism (Vol. 18, p. 115), a brilliant study of the foundations of an exact knowledge of the physiological process of heredity, by Prof. R. C. Punnett of Cambridge; Evolution (Vol. 10, p. 22) and Longevity (Vol. 16, p. 974), both by Dr. Mitchell; Nutrition (Vol. 19, p. 921), by Prof. D. N. Paton and Dr. E. P. Cathcart of Glasgow University; Dietetics (Vol. 8, p. 214), by the world-famous authority on this subject, the late Prof. W. O. Atwater, and R. D. Milner, formerly of the U. S. Dept, of Agriculture; Vegetarianism (Vol. 27, p. 967), by Dr. Josiah Oldfield, senior physician to the Lady Margaret Fruitarian Hospital, Bromley; Climate in the Treatment of Disease (Vol. 6, p. 526); Acclimatization (Vol. 1, p. 114), by the renowned scientist, Dr. A. Russel Wallace; a very complete and up-to-date article on Vivisection (Vol. 28, p. 153), by Dr. Stephen Paget; Psychology (Vol. 22, p. 547), by Prof. James Ward of Cambridge; Psychical Research (Vol. 22, p. 544), by Andrew Lang, which is the key to a series of 25 remarkably interesting articles covering the entire subject; Hypnotism (Vol. 14, p. 201); Faith Healing (Vol. 10, p. 135); Suggestion (Vol. 26, p. 48); Phrenology (Vol. 21, p. 534), by Professor Macalister of Cambridge; Temperance (Vol. 26, p. 578), by Dr. Arthur Shadwell; Microscope (Vol. 18, p. 392); Blindness, Causes and Prevention (Vol. 4, p. 60), by Sir Francis J. Cambell, principal Royal Normal College for the Blind, London; Deaf and Dumb (Vol. 7, p. 880), by Rev. A. H. Payne, formerly of the National Deaf Mute College, Washington.