HOW KNOWLEDGE GROWS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18786, 15 June 1929, Page 4

HOW KNOWLEDGE GROWS.

WHENEVER MONEY is spent on radium for the treatment of disease there is a reasonable hope that it will advance the science of radio-therapy directly', since knowledge grows by compound interest. Progress has been slow, for one reason, because medical men cannot experiment with lives, and where the fate of a patient is at stake must recommend -the proved remedy. Another reason is that radium is dangerous and tricky stuff to handle, and certain of its rays, with which medicine is wholly concerned, have had no selective action, but strike every cell they meet, whether healthy or abnormal. The more effective treatment of cancer began only when metal containers were employed to intercept these non-seleclive ray's, and allow a passage only for the “ gamma ” rays, which have a specially deleterious influence on quickly growing tissues, such as cancer, and leave normal cells comparatively scathless. The new “ surgery of access,” which surrounds aud penetrates a cancer growth by numerous needles, has given wonderful results, although the science is still in a state of flux. The purchase of thirty-six radium needles for the Christchurch Hospital at a cost of £I4OO is certainly not in advance of the times, but it must be remembered that the money and opportunity will largely be thrown away unless there are ample facilities for training and research by the men who arc going to use it.