ACUTE TONSILLITIS: TREATMENT BY RECTAL ADMINISTRATION OF A NEW BISMUTH COMPOUND

Abstract

One of the commonest infections with which the physician has to deal is acute tonsillitis. Its symptom complex of fever, general malaise, sore throat, dysphagia and tenderness of the submaxillary lymph nodes is so well known that more detailed description is unnecessary. Acute tonsillitis usually lasts for a week to ten days and is considered a self-limited disease except in the few patients in whom complications, such as peritonsillar abscess or acute nephritis, occur. However, the patients are so uncomfortable and the prostration so great that any therapy directed toward amelioration of the symptoms and especially toward shortening the duration of the illness is a welcome addition to the therapeutic armamentarium. Salicylates and other antipyretic drugs have been generally employed, but, while this medication makes the patient more comfortable, it must be considered as nothing more than symptomatic therapy; it certainly does not shorten the disease or the incapacity resulting