Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LECTURE III. Chemo-therapeutic Studies On Trvpanosomes. The studies on trypanosomes, which have of late been carried out with the greatest energy, especially in the Institut Pasteur in Paris, the School of Tropical Medicine in Liverpool, and the Speyerhaus in Frankfort-on-the-Main, are of the greatest theoretical and practical importance ; for in this field of study the patient research work of Experimental Therapeutics has first come into full activity, and at the same time a basis has been gained on which we may hope successfully to undertake the practical attempt of suppressing sleeping-sickness. The exceedingly great difficulty of these studies is evidenced by the fact that hundreds and thousands of substances have to be examined by animal experiments, before a few producing a therapeutic effect can be found. I myself have in course of time examined more than 600 such substances. From their effect on animals, hints may be obtained as to what to avoid, and in what direction therapeutics should advance. I will not enter here into the details of my work, but will only give you a general resume of the chief results. The substances which have hitherto proved efficient in combating trypanosome infections can be divided into three groups, viz. :— (i) The group of the basic triphenyl-methane dyes; (2) The group of the benzidine dyes; (3) The group of the arsenicals. The salts of mercury may be used as adjuvants to each of the foregoing. Among the triphenyl-methane stains, which were first employed by Wendelstadt, para- fuchsin is by far the most satisfactory. It is possible, by prophylactic feeding with this drug, to render mice resistant to trypanosome infections for a long time, and I believe that this innocent substance might well be employed in the Tropics for th...