THE SUN CURE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19946, 13 November 1926, Page 24

THE SUN CURE.

MAGIC HEALING OF SOLAR RAYS. SOME WONDERFUL CURES. “ Six weeks in the sun,” said my doctor, “ will put that lung right.” So I went to Leysin, and stayed four months (says a correspondent of the Morning Post). Sun cures like other cures are apt to take just twice as long as the doctor says. I had scarcely heard of the famous Dr Rollier and his sun-clinic in Switzerland till my lung misbehaved; it seemed a long and lonely journey to take, but there was hope at the end. Arrived at the top of the mountains I was promptly put to bed in the clinic, and forbidden to stir hand or foot for a fortnight. This is a precaution taken with every patient to accustdm them to the altitude. After that the patient, if reasonably well, is left to shift for himself. Rollier’s system demands as much independence as is safe'. Coddling is discouraged. It seems a bit chilly (after the attentions of a nursing home in London) to get up and wash onseself, take one’s own temperature, make one’s own bed if it gets disarranged after the nurse has once done it; to lie alone for hours and get oneself ready for the night. The cure begins with five minutes’ exposure of the feet. Next day the feet have 10 minutes in the sun, and the legs five; the day after the knees are included. And so progressively. It is a fortnight before the entire body takes the sun for five minutes. The head is protected by a linen hat, the eyes by dark glasses, and the heart by a handkerchief or pad. Once the cure is fully established the patient may take the sun for many hours a day. Too much sun is as bad as too little. The cure must be followed carefully; but oh! how wonderful it is. Sometimes the heat and brilliance when one was out ski-ing tempted one to undress in the snow and take the sun then and there. Once I came upon a school of tiny boys doing their lessons in the snow, perfectly naked except for their sun-hats and goggles. The whole village of Leysin is given up to clinics varying in price from the \ T ery moderate to the super-luxurious. Patients well enough to go about are encouraged to develop the community spirit and visit the less fortunate. There is a dreadful monotony in lying still, and the poorer patients have very little diversion except news of their neighbours’ progress arid the inspiring weekly visits of the great Rollier —like all great figures, a very simple person. One sees magic cures; a rickety imbecile-looking baby changed in a few weeks to a chubby, intelligent child; a paralysed youAg man—t.b. of the spine—enabled to walk—with a promise that soon he may ski! The rare cases for •which the cure is considered unsuitable are heart cases, which cannot stand the height.