ADVANCE OF SCIENCE

Taranaki Daily News, 18 October 1927, Page 14

ADVANCE OF SCIENCE

. TREATMENT OF CANCER / RADIUM AND SURGERY. KILLING CANCEROUS TISSUE. San Francisco, Aug. 22. Medical authorities at tba Memorial Hospital at West 106th Street in New York have just announced that in the treatment of more than 1000 cases of cancer in the last two years “vary encouraging success in a group of eases, formerly invariably fatal, has been attained with the use of radium combined with surgery.” The eases included, it was said, cancer of the tongue, tonsils, lower mouth, upper jaw, antrum and nasal passages. The method employed consists of the implantation in the caqcerous tissue of a minute, needle-shaped gold tube filled with radium gas, and the surgical removal, after treatment with radium and high voltage X-ray, of the adjacent lymph nodes which has served as a barrier to the spread of the cancer cells from the original infection.

The process cannot properly be termed a cure for cancer, according to Dr. Francis Carter Wood, director of the Crocker Research Institute at Columbia University, New York, and authorities of the Memorial Hostpial. It has, however, effected some scientific advance, for one of the latter said it “had greatly improved the outlook" for patients with cancer of the oral and nasal recesses.

The Memorial Hospital, which recently acquired four grammes of radium, valued at 250.090 dollars, through the gift of Edward S. Harkness. has contributed much to the development of the new- process. The basis for the treatment was worked out 17 years ago by Dr. Henry Janeway, then conducting, research work at the hospital, who evolved the method of inserting tiny glass tubes filled witfc radium gas in cancerous tissue. The glass tube was never wholly satisfactory because me caustic beta ravs of u» radium had a tendency to uiirn" the surrounding healthy tissue. SURGERY BEST. About five years ago, according to Dr. Wood, Professor Regaud, of the Paris Radium Institute, discovered that the substitution of -platinum for glass tubing resulted in the filtering out of the harmful beta rays without interfering with the gamma rays, which kill the cancerous tissue. Later the Memorial Hospital adopted gold tubing with similar results. The method has since been adopted by numerous hospitals. Dr, Wood, in a lecture on caneer at Havemeyer Hall, Columbia University, on August 11, declared that the methods so far evolved for the treatment of cancer have not. succeeded in cheeking tile death rate attributable to that disease. The American Society for the Control of Caneer, under whose auspices lie spoke, still holds, he asserted, that the surgical removal of cancerous tissue, where possible, is the most successful method of treatment. “Radium and X-ray are not the equivalent of surgery,” he said. Discussing experiments -conducted in his laboratory, ho said that the cisease cannot be transmitted from generation to generation in connection with the Medelia Law, but that may persons seem to have a hereditary susceptibility to caneer. It is not contagious and not due to a germ,’ lie believed, but the only practicable method of control appeared to be to make the disease “notifiable” to health authorities like any contagious disease, in order that those afflicted might receive competent medical treatment before the tumour has pri>giessed to a hope less stage. EXIT.ACTING OIL FROM GOAL. Restoration of Britain’s coal industry, with the resultant re-employment of thousands of idle miners, together with making that nation independent as an oil producer, is hoped - to be accomplished by au English invention for the extraction of crude oil from coal, details of which were explained to members of the fuel conservatisn committee of the CCS. Shipping Board in New York by 11. A. Bradstreet, representing an English syndicate behind the invention. Mr. Bradstreet was enthusiastic over the possibilities of the invention, which is hoped to solve Great Britain’s industrial problems, and he stressed the fact, that not only can crude oil and other by-products be extracted from British coal, but the residue can be utilised as smokeless fuel in industrial plants ashore and under marine boilers aboard ship. Mr. Bradstreet said that the English process for extraction has already been used by some firms abroad, and that one company has begun production on a fair-sized scale. This company started with six plants with a capacity of 100 tons of coal a day. From the 600 tons of coal Mr. Bradstreet claims that the company can produce 12,000 gallons of crude oil, 1,800,009 cubic feet of gas, leaving a residue of 420 tons of coal which can be used in the domestic grate or pulverised for industrial or marine plants. It was also stated that the English process already has been tried out in a small plant, and an average of twenty gallons of crude oil lias been extracted from each ton of coal. The Natural Physics Laboratory of Great Britain lias reported that the oil from British coal will stand a pressure up to 1000 pounds a square inch. The oil extracted also gives fifty per cent, less wear on the machinery bearings. The inventors also hope to obtain light, lamp and lubricating oils, diesel fuel, paraffin wax. disinfectant and tar for roadbeds from tha extraction process. GOWS AND TUBERCULOSIS. Five months ago ten cows which had shown every sign of advanced tuberculosis, and which had been condemned by United States herd inspectors, were selected for a test of tha supposed tuberculosis cure evolved by Dr. George Kirkpatrick, the Portland veterinarian in Oregon. Three of the cattle have, now -been slaughtered and. subjected to a searching examination for traces of the disease. At the end of the examination the carcases o* all three jvere passed on by Dr. A. J. Diane, United States inspector, as free from the tuberculosis and fit for human sustenance. > This was the outstanding development'

of a scientific clinic held in Portland as a climax to the official test sponsored by the City Health Bureau and other research agencies.