MEDICAL RESEARCH.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XL, Issue 7405, 22 September 1902, Page 2

MEDICAL RESEARCH.

Ov innumerable occasions during the part few year*, report! • h_T« bt.n published of the miraculous cures effected through theagoncy ofta- X rays beams. Included an-ong the recoveries wero patient/suffering from lupus, turn >urs, •md mmy f.irmi of skin dUeases- Tho former objectionable disease is treat*! with what is known as the Fiusen light cure, tho London Hospital in paricular possessing a very completo apparatus of the kind indicated, presented to t by Queen Alexander, and another presented recently by Mr Alfred Harins«orlh, together with an endowment ot £10,000 for {ho Light Department of ihe Hospital. Tne Finsen rays, which have proved so successful, differ from the X rays, in that they are administered through an instrument somewhat resembling a telescope, and pressed closeto the jaw. The light, at first, is on! allowed to fall on ens part of the face at a time, and then subsequently, of tbo whole. Tlie treatment lasts about an hour per day. ' Dunn;,' the past eighteen months a new application of tho X rays lias been discovered, and,, according to a southei'it exchange, a well-known commercial resident of Christchurch has been or.c of ihe first to receive practical benefit The patient had been a sufferer from, rodent ulcer for fully twenty-six yenrs. and last August, when he proceeded to England for treatment, the disease had made alarming progress on his face, which wjis practically disfigured. On ar/ival'.in London he placed himself under Dr. Sequeira, one of the foremost medical men it; tho West End of Lrmdon, Honorary Head of the Light Department of the Loudon Hospital, nnd discoverer of the new application of the rays. In this case the same X Rays apparatus as U employed in photography w"s used' ilie light bt' inK a<l ministered through a round globe instead of through a small screen. The light is directed immediately on tho affected parts, a mask being worn to prevent the rest of the faeo being injured. An exposure of the ulcer to this treatment for ten minutes per day forms the basis of the cure. The ease under notice was a particularly aggravated one and it was thought fully twelve months' treatment would be needed before there would bo any direct benefit, but at the end of eight days a_ improvement was noticeable and in six months a complete cure had been effected. The importance of the cure may bo gathered from the fact that at the termination of the treatment Dr Sequeira took the patient before the London Medical Society in Chandosstreet, Cavendish Square, and explained the circumstances of the disease and its treatment before several hundred medical men who evinced the greatest interest m the case. Dr Stephen McKenzie. another London medical man, al>o lectured upon him. Tlio cause of the disensc has not yet been ascertained and the process of the healing was also more than the doctor could explain, but he added the possibilities of th..- X rays were not by any means known as yet and the treatment is still in its infancy.