PROGRESS IN THE PREPARATION OF PANCREATIC EXTRACTS FOR THE TREATMENT OF DIABETES*

Abstract

Seldom does science—medical science in particular—advance in perfectly straight lines, or by perfectly logical steps one directly above the other. In ascending the mountain of knowledge as in ascending physical mountains progress more often is accomplished by a zig-zag course. At times a mountain trail may seem to have lost the habit of ascending; it may even recede toward lower levels. And it is only by patiently threading one’s way through obscuring growths at the base of the mountain, and then ofttimes after further baffling experiences in fogs about the higher levels, that one emerges finally to the clearer view and the immediate consciousness of achievement. Such has been the progress of understanding in the treatment of diabetes. Not for a third of a century—not indeed since the demonstration by Mirikowski and von Mehring (1) in 1889 that the seat of the disease is in the pancreas—had there been any really great advance