Abstract
SANATORIUM TREATMENT OF PULMONARY TUBERCULOSIS.—“Although it was at one time believed that sanatoria were effective in curing phthisis, and at the present time it is tacitly assumed that they are at least effective in favourably influencing the progress of the disease, it has never been satisfactorily proved that such is really the case.” With the assistance of M. Noel Karn, Dr. Percy Stocks has made an elaborate study of the first 2794 consecutive cases of undoubted pulmonary tuberculosis brought under the survey of the Belfast Tuberculosis Dispensaries from 1914 onwards. His results, published in Annals of Eugenics, vol. 1, parts 3 and 4, show that the average ultimate progress, as estimated over a period of six years unless the patient had been previously lost to view, was undoubtedly worse in the case of the sanatorium-treated than in the case of patients otherwise treated, for cases first seen in the incipient stage, but was not significantly different for patients first seen in advanced stages. Judged by the proportion in whom the disease became arrested or apparently cured, sanatorium treatment showed a temporary superiority during the first two or three years which was lost in subsequent years. While length of stay at a sanatorium was not found to be correlated with ultimate progress, there was an appreciable relation between regularity of dispensary treatment and progress. No consistent evidence was found that bad housing conditions, as judged by rent, class of house, state or cleanliness of rooms, or overcrowding, had any influence on ultimate progress or rate of recovery. The authors suggest that sanatorium treatment should be reserved for patients diagnosed very early, those so ill as to require hospital treatment, or those whose circumstances demand their removal from home.
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Research Items. Nature 118, 171–172 (1926). https://doi.org/10.1038/118171a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/118171a0