SWISS SUN CURE

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 150, 21 March 1925, Page 18

SWISS SUN CURE

SCHOOL AMONG THE MOUNTAINS I

More than 20 years ago a Swiss peasant who had cut his hand consulted a young medical practitioner and - was advised to expose the wound to the sunlight. The practitoner was Dr. Rollier, who is now famous for his sun treatment of bone tuberculosis.

He had noted how rapidly and cleanly the wounds of the peasants healed in the bright, sunny atmosphere of the Swiss mountains. ’lt was these observations that led him to try what sunlight could do for bone tuberculosis.

He chose Leysin as the idea! spot for the experiment—a little mountain hamlet in the High Alps at an altitude of 4500 ft. on the southern slope of the Tours d’Ai chain of mountains. Amongst the tuberculosis patients who came to him were hunchbacks (Pott’s disease), patients with large, unsightly glands on their necks, with bodies utterly twisted and deformed and covered with repulsive ulcers. Manv of these unfortunate sufferers had been through operation after operation or had lain for months in plaster casts. Dr. Rollier banished tb“ knife and the plaster cast. He exposed the diseased limbs to the suncglit, beginning with small doses Cures that seemed almost miraculous were effected, and soon the clinic became known, and patients came from all parts of the world. The work started in a modest little chalet, is now carried on in 34 clinics, built with balconies perfectly adapted to sun treatment, and there are SOO patients, adults and children, who are benefiting, and the larger proportion absolutely cured. Amongst woods and pastures on a picturesque site at Cergnat, a few miles from Leysin, Dr. Rollier has estab-

lished the school in the sun, or Preventorium, as he calls it, where children pre-disposed to phthisis, with enlarged glands, anaemia, or rickets, are educated. At the present time there are children of ten nationalities at the school. The recent arrivals are still fairly pale, but the three-months pupils are already well tanned, and those who have been at the school for over a year are a deen cooper bronze.' The children always do their lessons in the open air; on wet days they sit in an open shed and or. fine days they’ go out with a teacher, carrying light folding desks and chairs with and choose a beautiful spot in the midst of the glistening snow-capped mountains. The only garments they wear are bathing-drawers, and. they sit with the sun shining on their backs. The action of the sun’s rays produces muscular development, and. prevents lateral i curvature 'of the spine. One hour a dav is spent in gymnastics. dumb-bells,' and breathing exercises. Close to the school a little agricultural colony’ has been started * for children, consisting of two chalets and a living chalet. It is directed bv a former patient, who has been completely cured of Pott’s disease. The students arc convalescents from bone tuberculosis, and delicate children predisposed to tuberculosis sent straight from the sen level They attend, the school in the sun so as to continue their education at the same time as thev build up their bodies: and instead of being doomed to die young, or linger for years bedridden, they become vigorous and useful members of the community.—“ Westminster Gazette.”