The Intravenous Use of Calcium Chloride in Tuberculous Enteritis

Abstract

T HERE have been many changes in the treatment of tuberculosis in the last few years. Formerly the sanatoria were equipped only to give patients long-continued rest in bed, good nourishing food, attractively served, and a maximum of fresh air. This has stood the test of time and has proven successful in many cases. Yet a sanatorium which can give its patients only these fundamental accessories is failing lamentably. A modern tuberculosis sanatorium should be fitted out as a general hospital; it requires an operating room where major and minor operations may be done. Patients should not be allowed to languish and die, consumed by the toxins of the tubercle bacilli without some effort being made to stop the inroads of the devastating tuberculous process. Where tuberculosis occurs in the lungs, this is done by the surgical procedures of artificial pneumothorax, phrenicectomy and the more radical Sauerbruch operation (thoracoplasty). The well known group of symptoms distressing to many tuberculous patients: abdominal pain, vomiting and diarrhea, which sometimes are symptomatic of tuberculous enteritis and which disturb the patient's rest and nutrition, have been relieved by the intravenous injection of calcium chloride. It is known that healing in tuberculosis is accompanied by the depositing of lime salts in and around the tubercle, the necessary calcium being derived from the blood. Supersaturating the blood with calcium salts is of value in calcification of the tubercu-