First report of the Committee of the Philadelphia Medical Society on Quack Medicines : read on the 15th December, 1827, and ordered to be published by the Society.

  • Philadelphia Medical Society.
Date:
1828
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: First report of the Committee of the Philadelphia Medical Society on Quack Medicines : read on the 15th December, 1827, and ordered to be published by the Society. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    the probable number of certificates to which the practice in a large hospital would give rise in the course of a single year, if the cure of every case of a somewhat protracted disease were to lay claim to such notices. The valuable Hospital Reports published from time to time in various cities, would then give place to Hos* pital Certificates, with an effect on the march of medical improve- ment, of too painful a nature to be calmly contemplated. Dr. Parke goes on to speak of the cases of two ladies from southern states, the melancholy nature and result of which, so totally different from the tenor of his letter, will be laid before the society in a subsequent part of this report, in which it will also be seen that little, if any, credit can be attached to the Panacea as a remedial agent in Tregomain’s case.* It seems then, from the testimony of those whose certificates in favour of Swaim’s Panacea have been so much relied on by the proprietor, and his friends and coadjutors, that nothing is adduced in them calculated to inspire any confidence whatever in its use* On the contrary, Dr. Chapman’s having long since ceased to pre- scribe it, and his pointing out cases of its alarming effects, Dr. Gibson’s never having seen it succeed in scrofula, the constant failures when Dr. Dewees has prescribed it, added to Dr. Parke’s inexperience of its use, are all circumstances well calculated to deter from recommending it. The only decided effect is that pointed out by Dr. Gibson, of its salivating. The physician will, however, of course, prefer prescribing himself the medicine or combination of medicines to produce salivation, when he thinks this condition of things is required by the exigencies of the case. The committee, on application to the resident physician of the Pennsylvania Hospital, and to the Apothecary of the Philadelphia Alms House Infirmary, have obtained the following information respecting the time when Swaim’s Panacea was first introduced into the practice of those institutions, during what period it con* tinued to be prescribed, and by whom. Dr. Charles Mifflin, resident physician of the hospital, reports, that, as well as he can learn, Dr. Price was the person who first directed it, and who attended as surgeon to the hospital in the years 1822 and 1823, four months in each year. Dr. Parke, who See Appendix, A,