Vol. 60, 1909 - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

' attention,
of the ray, and must therefore await its
subsidence before giving more.
By observing the same caution in adding
to a maximum dose that we would in administering
morphine or strychnine, the ray
becomes as simple and amenable to use as
those powerful drugs have become.
MBCI1«NIGA1> VIBHftTIOIS,
I
' ject
The surprising rapidity with which mechanical
vibration has been adopted by the
medical profession is in itself a powerful
argument in favor of its therapeutic value.
The fundamental princii^les underlying
its use are dependent upon its influence on
nerves or nerve centers; thereby regulating
the action or function controlled by them.
The fact that nerve-centers respond quickly
to mechanical stimulation is by no means
new, but the working out of the present system
of vibratory therapeutics is comparatively
recent.
A tap or light blow will immediately increase
the activity of a nerve-center. A
succession of such strokes will carry this
up to a certain required degree of stimulation.
Pushing it beyond this point overstimulation
or inhibition results. Thus,
according to I'^berhart, vibration jilaces
these two agencies, stimulation and inhibition,
at the command of the physician,
enabling him to increase the activity of
sluggish organs or functions; or to soothe
the same parts when irritated or over active.
When the vasomotor centers of the sympathetic
system are influenced by vibration
we have a change immediately taking place
in the size of the various blood-vessels controlled
by them and an alteration in the
amount of blood determined to a given area.
This, then, makes it theoretically possible
to equalize the circulation, increasing the
blood sui)ply when local anaemia exists
and decreasing it when congestion is present.
The advantage of this is obvious,
especially in the case of congestion, for do
we not remember the old precept that continued
congestion results in inflammation.
\'ibration also increases the elimination
of poisons and waste through the lymphatics
and this is an important feature.
Taking into consideration the relatively
small cost of vibrators, in comparison with
their great range of usefulness they form an
important part of the "up-to-date" physician's
eduipment.
161
pleasing style and also because it is essentially
important that practicing physicians
should know that there is such a thing as
"serum disease". Many doctors who have
employed antitoxin in the treatment of
diphtheria will recall cases in which the injection
of the remedy was followed by very
untoward symptoms. These occurrences
have perhaps led to a certain, and in some
measure, a justifiable opposition to the use
of antitoxin; it is however an opposition
having its origin in ignorance. Theobald
Smith was the first to note that experimental
animals often succumbed to second injections
of serum which, when given the first
time, had not been harmful. Rosenau and
Anderson in the Hygienic Laboratory of the
Public Health and Marine Hospital Service,
and Otto, working in Ehrlich's laboratory
in Frankfort, independently investigated
Smith's observations and thoroughly elucidated
the problem.
Serum disease (Die Serumkrankheit) is
due to anaphylaxis which may be defined
as the opposite of prophylaxis (Lemann).
Just as the latter term indicates a condition
favoring protection, hence lessened susceptibility,
so anaphylaxis means a condition
of decreased protection and increased susceptibility.
We have for a long time been
accustomed to the idea that by certain
measures, for instance, vaccination or the
injection of antidiphtheritic or antitetanic
serum, we may increase the resistance of
our bodies to certain diseases, but it has
been only within the past three years that
attention has been particularly devoted to
the fact that the injection of certain foreign
materials decreases the resisting power to
future injections of the same substances; in
other words we have begun to realize that
a condition of anaphylaxis is produced, the
results of which may be quite as dire as
those of the disease we originally started
out to treat. The substances which possess
this action are probably proteids, and, because
employed most, the serum of the horse
concerns us most. The reactions are not
due to the antitoxins contained in the therapeutic
sera, for they are etiually produced
by normal horse serum; nor are they due to
any of the preservatives usually added to
the sera. The anaphylactic constituents
are unaffected by heat or cold, or chemical
agencies. The reaction is specific, that is,
an animal sensitized with horse serum re-
f\fif\pn\L,f\xi».
acts only to horse serum; sensitized with
Our last issue contains an article on Ana- egg-white, it reacts only to egg-white, and
phylaxis by Dr. K. N. Duffy, of New Bern, so on. Anaphylaxis is transmitted heredi-
N. C, to which we wish to direct special tarily from mother to off spring and the un-
not only because of the great in- toward effects increase in severity with the
terest which is being manifested in the sub- length of interval between the injections.
throughout the world, but because the
author has presented the subject in most
It has been shown that an interval of at
least ten or twelve days must elapse be-