DR. KOCH'S DISCOVERY.

Press, Volume XLVIII, Issue 7756, 9 January 1891, Page 6

DR. KOCH'S DISCOVERY.

EXPERIMENTS IN ENGLAND. WHY THE SECRET IS NOT DISCLOSED. On November 26th Mr Watson Cheyne, one of the Professors of Surgery on the staff of King's College Hospital, London, inoculated four patients with Dr. Koch's fluid. Mr Watson Cheyne, who is the first to perform inoculation with the fluid in this country, is a personal friend of Dr. Koch's, and from the distinguished German scientist he recently obtained a small bottle of the fluid—a favor denied to many other doctors of eminence. With che tiny phial of the pale brown liquid, Mr Watson Cheyne lost no time in returning to London, bringing with him at the same time some of the inoculating syringes which Dr. Koch has found particularly adapted for injecting his fluid into the bodies of patients affected with tuberculosis. These syringes are remarkable mainly for their simplicity. They are easily taken to pieces and disinfected, or sterilised, to use the scientific phrase. The disinfectant used is pure alcohol. Before inoculating the patients—four in number—Mr Cheyne made a few remarks concerning the fluid, the absence of any considerable quamity of it beiug attribu. Ed to the fact chat for the moment there is a difficulty in producing ie of uniform strength. He said that at present the exact _ nature and constituents of the fluid are unknown, but it is evident that it is a product of the bacillus itself, though how prepared is not yet clear. The full dose is one cubic centimetre, and the injection is made in the back. The fluid acts through the blood, and it is for this reason thac the back is chosen as a starting point to send the flu id on its way. It must be noted, however, that the popular idea that the fluid acts towards . the bacillus in mush che same way as a ferret behaves when iv company of a rabbit is erroneous. The fluid does not actually destroy the bacilli beaped together in a diseased portion of the body. It acts on the tissues or cells in which the baccilli are snugly hiding, leaving everything else untouched. There is, indeed, a peculiar affinity between the fluid and the diseased tissue which resembles in some measure that existiu« between the loadstone and a needle. The one flies to the other naturally. The fluid having attacked the tissues in which the bacilli are concealed, certain changes take place in the body of the patient, and the following symptoms are to be noted : - Four or five hours after inoculation fever supervenes, tbe temperature rising to 105deg. Vomiting follows, and in the case of a large dose unconsciousness has occurred. There is a burning feeling in the infected part or parts, then swelling and a discharge, the affected part even sloughing. The rapidity with which the effects of the fluid make themselves apparent shows only too plainly what a powerful agency it is, and whac care is needed when using it. In some cases coma, extending over a period of twenty-four hours, has resulted from the injection of a large dose. The patients selected at King's College Hospital were four in number, and all males. The first was sufferiug from a diagnosed tuberculosis of the hip; the second was a severe case of lupus; the third, a boy of two years, was suffering from phthisis; whilst the fourth was a case of tuberculosis of the foot. The injection having been performed, the patients were sent to bed, and continuous relays of dressers will watch them, noting every change aud every new symptom. Students and doctors were invited to return to the hospital in the evening, when a thorough examination of che patients was made and progress reported. Inoculation will be repeated after each attack of fever has diminished, until the injection of the fluid produces no reaction. It is then to be concluded that the tuberculosis-infected tissues have been destroyed and ejected, carrying with them the bacilli, the root of the disease. Nourishment must then be the order of the day, and the patient may consider himself cured.

Dr. Koch informed the Times correspondent that it was eight years since he discovered the tubercular baciHus, and he had ever since been engaged iv the study of the parasite and in endeavoring to obtain the inoculating fluid which would kill the bacilli and bring out sufficiently strong and healthy reaction to dispel them from the body without at the same time destroying healthy organs. The discovery had cost years of his life, and he proposed to retain-the secret a few weeks longer from publicity. He added :— "Experience of premature disclosures has made mc wise. Were I to publish now, in the first stage of the discovery, the exact ingredients and the method ot preparation of the fluid, thousands of medical men, from Moscow to Buenos Ayres, would to-morrow be engaged in concocting it, and injecting it for that matter. Is it far-fetched, then, for mc to suppose, as I do, that more than half of these gentlemen are incompetent to prepare the fluid which, with special study and with special opportunities, it has taken mc years to prepare. Then these experiments might cause incalculable harm to thousands of innocent Satients, and at the same time bring into iscredit a system of treatment wbich I believe will be a boon to mankind." Then then Professor added earnestly and warmly:—" 1 believe I have the right that the first experiments in its use be made before my own eyes and with the tools which I have made and tested. If these experiments turn out successfully, then the medical world will find mc and my elevated assistants only too ready to initiate them into the treatment without the least reserve; but until then—it. seems perhaps selfish, but I really claim ie as at once our duty and the purest unselfishness—they must content themselves to be patient."