2 Eclectic Science and Regulatory Compliance: Stories for the Curious
addition, the dehydrating effects of purging with calomel, diaphoresis (sweating) with
sage tea, subemetic doses of tartar emetic, and blistering with cantharides would potenti-
ate the effect.
In retrospect, the doctors should have considered the fact the president previously
had been subject to recurrent febrile respiratory infections and other acute fevers proba-
bly due to malaria and pneumonia. One of his several bouts of fever was life-threatening,
and he required several weeks to recover.6
Treatment Methods
The scenario presented above was not unusual two centuries ago. Cathartics were major
components of colonial American therapy. Physicians relied on these drugs, more than
most others, to rid their patient’s bodies of the noxious materials they thought produced
some contagious diseases, to flush out the “unbalanced humors” thought to have pro-
duced their patient’s symptoms by disturbing the normal tone of solid tissues.7
Blistering with an alcoholic cantharides solution applied to the skin raised large
welts, which the physicians reasoned neutralized the naturally occurring inflamma-
tion responsible for the patient’s symptoms. Emetics, drugs that induce vomiting, were
thought to strengthen weak stomach muscle fibers. Diaphoretics were thought to make
the patient sweat out the disease and remove excess fluids.8
Bloodletting
Bloodletting also was employed commonly, and the president received prompt and
expert medical care that reflected the practices of that time.9 Special instruments (scarifi-
cators, fleams, lancets) and cupping vessels were sold to facilitate the procedure.
Bloodletting, or phlebotomy, likely is the longest-running tradition in medicine,
originating in the ancient civilizations of Egypt and Greece. The practice continued for
2,500 years until it was replaced by modern medical techniques. People did not begin to
question its value until the 19th century.10
Bloodletting is one of many discredited forms of therapy. One even more strange
was using one disease to treat another. The most glaring example was malariatherapy:
infecting patients with malaria in an effort to cure neurosyphilis.
Malariatherapy
There are few examples of one living pathogen being used to treat a disease caused by
another. However, malaria parasites were used for about 40 years to ameliorate or reverse
the effects of neurosyphilis, a life-threatening advanced stage of syphilis.11
Syphilis progresses through a primary localized phase, a secondary phase, a latent
period and, in some cases, a progressive tertiary phase involving almost any organ, but
usually the ascending aorta and the central nervous system (neurosyphilis). About a third
of neurosyphilitics remain asymptomatic.
Some eventually develop symptoms related to meningovascular or parenchymatous
lesions, the latter reflecting destructive inflammatory and degenerative processes in the
central nervous system. These are the imperative indications to induce fever to help
avoid progressive mental retardation, blindness and death.
addition, the dehydrating effects of purging with calomel, diaphoresis (sweating) with
sage tea, subemetic doses of tartar emetic, and blistering with cantharides would potenti-
ate the effect.
In retrospect, the doctors should have considered the fact the president previously
had been subject to recurrent febrile respiratory infections and other acute fevers proba-
bly due to malaria and pneumonia. One of his several bouts of fever was life-threatening,
and he required several weeks to recover.6
Treatment Methods
The scenario presented above was not unusual two centuries ago. Cathartics were major
components of colonial American therapy. Physicians relied on these drugs, more than
most others, to rid their patient’s bodies of the noxious materials they thought produced
some contagious diseases, to flush out the “unbalanced humors” thought to have pro-
duced their patient’s symptoms by disturbing the normal tone of solid tissues.7
Blistering with an alcoholic cantharides solution applied to the skin raised large
welts, which the physicians reasoned neutralized the naturally occurring inflamma-
tion responsible for the patient’s symptoms. Emetics, drugs that induce vomiting, were
thought to strengthen weak stomach muscle fibers. Diaphoretics were thought to make
the patient sweat out the disease and remove excess fluids.8
Bloodletting
Bloodletting also was employed commonly, and the president received prompt and
expert medical care that reflected the practices of that time.9 Special instruments (scarifi-
cators, fleams, lancets) and cupping vessels were sold to facilitate the procedure.
Bloodletting, or phlebotomy, likely is the longest-running tradition in medicine,
originating in the ancient civilizations of Egypt and Greece. The practice continued for
2,500 years until it was replaced by modern medical techniques. People did not begin to
question its value until the 19th century.10
Bloodletting is one of many discredited forms of therapy. One even more strange
was using one disease to treat another. The most glaring example was malariatherapy:
infecting patients with malaria in an effort to cure neurosyphilis.
Malariatherapy
There are few examples of one living pathogen being used to treat a disease caused by
another. However, malaria parasites were used for about 40 years to ameliorate or reverse
the effects of neurosyphilis, a life-threatening advanced stage of syphilis.11
Syphilis progresses through a primary localized phase, a secondary phase, a latent
period and, in some cases, a progressive tertiary phase involving almost any organ, but
usually the ascending aorta and the central nervous system (neurosyphilis). About a third
of neurosyphilitics remain asymptomatic.
Some eventually develop symptoms related to meningovascular or parenchymatous
lesions, the latter reflecting destructive inflammatory and degenerative processes in the
central nervous system. These are the imperative indications to induce fever to help
avoid progressive mental retardation, blindness and death.