The campaign against cancer : educational, experimental and clinical / by William Seaman Bainbridge.

  • Bainbridge, William Seaman, 1870-1947.
Date:
1911
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The campaign against cancer : educational, experimental and clinical / by William Seaman Bainbridge. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    pain in advanced and otherwise inoperable cases, as practised by the author and others. In addition to the legitimate experimen¬ tation, in surgical procedure, carried on in the operating room, there is also a line of legitimate experimentation to be pursued at the bedside of the patient, namely, the testing of various non-surgical methods of treatment. . Under this category may be placed the various sera, vaccines, toxins, cancer extracts, etc.; physiological products, such as enzymes (trypsin and amylopsin), thyriod extract, etc. Under this head, also, come the various so-called “cures” of one kind or another, some seemingly founded on scientific fact, others more or less theo¬ retical, yet having something, apparently, in their favor. All such methods which fur¬ nish a reasonable hope of doing definite good with an assurance of doing no positive harm should go through the clinical clear¬ ing-house to be approved or disapproved, by actual clinical test, in a series of suitable cases. Certain physical agents, likewise, such as radium, and the various newer methods of application of electrical treatmeent, should be tested in one or more of our clinical clearing-houses. Such tests come under the head of legitimate clinical experimen¬ tation. CLINICAL. The prevention of cancer by the eradi¬ cation of known predisposing causes, or at least causes which, from long and varied experience, have come to be accepted as known, forms a most important part of the clinical campaign against the disease. Certain predisposing elements in the pro¬ duction of cancer are now pretty generally accepted as having greater of less etiologic influence. Among these are race, sex, heredity, general nutrition, local nutrition, chronic irritation, repeated acute trauma, chronic inflammation, cicatricial tissue— scars, burns, etc.—and benign tumors— warts, moles, nevi, etc. Various other factors are considered by different students of the cancer problem to bear some relationship to cancer incidence. Among these may be mentioned climate, soil, occupation and habits of life. In ad¬ dition to these, certain pathological states have been associated by different investiga¬ tors with cancer. Notable among these conditions are tuberculosis, syphilis and diabetes. It is not within the scope of this contri¬ bution to discuss the relative merits of the various supposed predisposing factors in the production of cancer, nor yet to consider them all from the clinical point of view. Certain of them, however, seem to be suf¬ ficiently well established as having a definite bearing upon the incidence of the disease to be considered an important feature of the educational, experimental and clinical cam¬ paign. Notable among these contributing causes are chronic irritation, chronic inflam¬ mation, cicatrices and benign tumors. In a large proportion of cases, unfortu¬ nately, the surgeon is the court of last appeal, while the general practitioner, the dermatol¬ ogist, the gynecologist, or the specialist in whatever field, is consulted first. We say unfortunately for the simple reason that the surgeon, who sees so much of the ultimate end of the disease, is more likely to be im¬ pressed with the importance of making the early diagnosis and instituting the proper treatment, than is the general practitioner or the specialist in other lines, who sees the beginning or pre-cancerous condition in per¬ haps the majority of instances. The re¬ sponsibility for the prevention and early diagnosis of cancer, therefore, must rest more heavily upon the general practitioner or specialist in other lines, than upon the sur¬ geon. Believing this to be true, we have sought to demonstrate, by presenting certain phases of the clinical side of the question, the need of an educational campaign against cancer, and to emphasize the important part to be played in such a campaign by the general body of the medical profession. The most telling arguments, after all, are actual cases of cancer. From these practical deductions for both patient and physician may be drawn. By studying cases, more than bv discussing theoretical questions, will be furthered the pevention, early diagnosis and cure of cancer, which is the prime motive of a campaign of education concerning the dis¬ ease. We have therefore selected for this purpose a series of cases, or, rather, a series of classes of cases, the counterparts of which could doubtless be multiplied many times in the experience of every practitioner of medicine. In our annual clinical lectures at the New