LIVER CURE

Greymouth Evening Star, 16 April 1934, Page 11

LIVER CURE

. COMBATING SEASICKNESS Hopes of an effective means of preventing sea, train, and air sickness have been aroused as the result of recent research at the Middlesex Hospital.

So far the research has been concerned only with X-ray sickness —a complaint which makes it impossible for some cancer patients to continue with X-ray treatment. A German physician, Dr. Dittel, found that X-ray sickness could be cured by the injection of liver extract.

His work was repeated recently by Dr. Douglas Webster, head of the radiological department at Middlesex Hospital. He found that it was completely successful. When patients hitherto prostrated by X-ray sickness were given the extract the sickness disappeared. “The use of liver opens up extremely interesting possibilities,” Dr. Webster told a representative of ‘The Daily Telegraph.’ “I have only recently begun to use it in cases of X-ray sickness, and I have not had the opportunity of discovering -whether it can be used move widely. But in view of the fact that the people who have got the greatest relief from it are those susceptible to sea-sickness and train-sickness the extract may be able to cure both these types of sickness. If so, it will do an immense amount of good, for it can be obtained very cheaply. Cancer patients are already overjoyed at its results.” The discovery is regarded as a great

advance in the treatment of cancer. A member of the staff of the Middlesex Hospital said that quite 10 per cent, of the patients treated with Xray suffered from sickness afterwards.

“In some cases,” he said, “it has been necessary to suspend the treatment altogether. In others it has had to be modified to such an extent that it has been of little or no use in stemming the progress of the disease. Many patients have pleaded to be allowed to die rather than endure the sickness. The extract is injected into the muscle. Any nurse -with training in inter-muscular injection can carry it out. Dr. Webster has had inquiries from all over the country about the treatment, and he is convinced that it will make a. big difference in the success of X-ray treatment for cancel’ ■and other serious diseases.”