CLIFT SANITARIUM A MEDICAL AND GENERAL HOSPITAL SANITARIUM The Sanitarium, under the personal supervision of Dr. Fred- Resident Physician, Dr. J. E. Morton, Kaysville, Utah. City Offices Dr. Clift can be seen by appointment at McIntyre Building, Bell or Ind. Phones, (Long Distance) Kaysville No. 98 UTAH SCHOOL OF MEDICINE The Utah School of Medicine is the medical department of the un! versity of Utah. Two years of a full medical course are offered, and, in connection with the School of Arts and Sciences, a four-year college course in Arts and Medicine, leading to the Bachelor's degree is given. The work done in the Utah School of Medicine is accepted by the best medical schools of the United States. The various laboratories are well equipped for the work given, and afford excellent advantages to students. They also offer fine opportunities to practicing physicians to make important tests and experiments. Send for the University Catalog, which describes the various courses offered, the requirements for admission, cost of tuition, etc. UNIVERSITY OF UTAH, Salt Lake City, Utah. quency Outfit, Treatment Lamp, Cautery or X-Ray Outfit and we will make your money buy more. THE SAM J. GORMAN COMPANY Logan Square MANUFACTURERS CHICAGO, ILL. UTAH SECTION Denver Medical Times and Utah Medical Journal Address all articles, personals, items of interest, and books for review, intended for the Utah Section, to the Editor, Frederic Clift, M.D., McIntyre Building, Salt Lake City, Utah. All advertising correspondence should be addressed to the main publishing office, 1839 Champa Street, Denver, Colorado. Our prices on Reprints about cover actual cost. Those ordering Reprints must order at the time of revising their proofs. Editor DR. FREDERIC CLIFT, 523 McIntyre Building, Salt Lake City, Utah Provo Dr. Eugene H. Smith..... H. K. Merrill, M.D. Murray. A. A. Bird, M.D. Mount Pleasant. Geo. W. Baker, M.D. H. B. Forbes, M.D. Editorial Collaborators E. K. Ward, M.D. J. W. Aird, M.D. R. W. Fisher, M.D. ....Ogden E. D. Hammond, M.D E. S. Wright, M.D. UTAH STATE BOARD OF HEALTH. F. S. Bascom, M.D., President, Salt Lake. Fred Stauffer, M.D., Salt Lake. UTAH STATE BOARD OF MEDICAL EXAMINERS. D. C. Budge, President, Logan. George F. Harding, Secretary, Salt Lake. C. F. Osgood, Ogden. F. E. Straup, Bingham Canyon. C. L. Olson, Murray. Clarence Snow, Salt Lake. STATE BOARD OF DENTAL EXAMINERS. A. C. Wherry, Salt Lake. E. A. Tripp, Salt Lake. It has been said, "Blessed is he that expects little, for he shall receive nothing." The members of the State Medical Association have learned to expect but little from their official organ, and probably were not disappointed when they found themselves entirely ignored last month. The organ of the State Associations of Oregon, Washington and Idaho, being devoted to the interests of the medical profession of the Pacific Northwest, felt no compunction in crowding out the Cinderella Sister-Utah. We notice, too, that Alaska was frozen out. PREVENTIVE MEDICINE. What shall we eat? What shall we drink? Wherewithal shall we be clothed? These are fundamental questions which must be rightly answered when providing for the care of the body. Fortunately nature suggests answers, if we will only go to her, deliberately making up our minds to obey her dictates. It is, however, safe to affirm that a large proportion of the ills of life come from a misuse of the knowledge which nature does her best to compel us to recognize. Hygienic laws are taught too much as the laws of the Medes and Persians might be taught-dogmatic statements of hygienic truths are always objectionable because liable to be successfully disputed by the first gossip who happens to speak of them. They are often controverted by experience. If you tell a robust woman in the most positive manner that every one needs a certain number of cubic feet of pure air in his sleeping room and she, remembering that she has slept for years in a small room shut up like a box, goes off thinking of the superiority of her experience to your theory; but explain to her the part played by oxygen in the system and she will wonder she is still alive. The weak point in school teaching is that too little is said about the conservative power of nature, yet the subject is one of the greatest importance, for in all walks of life a knowledge of hygiene would save much of the time now lost as a result of sickness and would make work easier and life happier. If we wound an arm we put it in a sling and use other members of the body until it is sufficiently rested. This is true of physical injuries, and the same physiological law holds good in the practice of medicine. Day by day and every day we find the laws of hygiene are better understood and that they are taking firmer hold upon the people, and through them upon their representatives. Death often threatens, but comes at last to all alike. The decrees of the Great Ruler of the Universe are inscrutible. He sees fit to try our faith in the valley of the shadow of death-in perils of waters-in perils in the wilderness-in weariness and painfulness. Yet He restoreth the soul and the grim enemy is from time to time overcome by human means and efforts. Faith teaches us to cling to the last straw-pain compels us to suubmit to the dictates of the physician. "A wise man forseeth the evil and hideth himself," is as true today as when it was written and it is merely another way of stating that old chestnut, "An ounce of prevention is worth. a pound of cure." A sound chestnut, however, is none the worse for age, and if we find people acting upon the opposite principle it is our duty to keep repeating the "old saw" until the truth is recognized. It is this reiteration of truths which at last sways the popular voice and gives the state the necessary fulcrum, by which the inert mass of ignorance, and oftentimes criminal stupidity, is swept away and controlled by legal sanctions. Prevention is not a modern science, but a neglected one. Let us, however, be thankful. Vast strides have been made during the last few years, and in no way are the advantages of preventive medicine so well and clearly shown as in these days of antiseptic surgery. A few years ago, if anyone had sug gested the idea or attempted to perform the operation of opening the abdominal cavity, he would have been looked upon as a candidate for the asylum, but since the introduction of antiseptics and other methods for preventing infection from the surrounding air, these operations are now performed, with but a minimum of appreciable danger. The same rule applies to all classes of wounds which formerly nearly always ran a fatal course, not only from infection and contamination from the air, but from infective particles lodging on the instruments and everything connected in any way with the dressing of the wound. Contamination led to the various complications in surgical diseases, such as profuse discharges and loss of tissue. Now, under the preventive treatment, viz., the use of such methods as will prevent the entrance of infection into wounds, these disadvantages are almost entirely done away with. So much so, indeed, that even in such cases as are already infected, the most brilliant results have followed the adoption of the preventive method. Preventive medicine, therefore, is receiving a great amount of attention, and the time is fast coming when it will dominate over curative medicine. The existing relation of the doctor to society is an absurdity. We use but half his skill when we employ him merely to cure the sick and heal the wounded. He should be much more employed in teaching the public the the avoidance of disease and healthful modes of living. Our churches support numerous hospitals throughout the country, thus giving practical effect to the teaching of Him who healed all manner of diseases amongst the people. Let our churches go a step further and teach the gospel of health-a clean mind and a clean body are concommitants-the possession of a robust, perfect and vigorous body are primary elements to the attainment of power, honor, and even wealth, and to such an extent was this recognized amongst nations that prior to the Christian era the decrepid and sickly were often put to death to prevent them from being burdens and causes of weakness to the state. The history of our race shows that physical force caused the rise, and its want led to the downfall of empires and kingdoms. So, too, nations which rose on brute force and physical develop ment fell when they degenerated and became effeminate by indulgence in luxurious and riotous living, and the neglect of those habits of life which had given rise to their greatness and power. England, with her Norman blood and stature, engrafted on Saxon simplicity and perseverence, rose from a rude and barbaric state to a powerful kingdom, and now to a wealthy and controlling empire. Her statute books are full of laws relating to sanitary regulations, the limitation of the hours of labor for those likely to be imposed upon, viz.: women and children. Disraeli, who later became Lord Beaconsfield, spoke the truth when he said "The health of the people is the first duty of the state," and it was because of his firm and constant advocacy of the rights of the people in this respect that his policy was described by one of his most bitter opponents as a policy of sewerage. But it, nevertheless, endeared and made him the idol of thʊ English people. Centuries ago the republics of Greece and Rome had their sanitary laws, and the argument then, as today, was that physical culture would secure physical health. The old Romans had their system of ventilation, drainage and sewerage, their splendid aquaducts, baths and pavements, and these all combined to promote the comfort and health of the people. History repeats itself in no dubious form. The state possessing the best sanitary laws and bestowing most attention to the requirements of health will show the greatest advancement in population, in wealth, in mental culture and all that tends to comfort, happiness and true greatness, and it must ever be so. Sanitary law is of divine. origin and constitutes a large proportion of the Mosaic writings. The creator enjoined on the seed of Abraham a code of laws calculated not only to restore health, but also to prevent disease. The methods of restoring health were looked upon as miraculous inter positions, knowledge being then in its infancy, but we find the methods of preserving health were based on natural laws which in a very great measure are the same today as in those remote ages. Alas! how much better were such laws, carried out in those early days, than they are in very many of our towns in this, the twentieth century of the Christian era. self in relation to his brother practitioners. At the request of the State Board of Health we call attention to the fac that the medical profession of Utah is not as a body complying with the requirements of chapter 90, section 1, of the laws of Utah, which requires physicians and superintendents of hospitals to report cases of veneral disease. We Ask yourselves who is to blame for quote the section in full: this. The state cannot secure obedience to law without the sympathy and cooperation of the people. Light (and air, cleanliness and order, are the great preservers of health, and the wives, mothers and daughters, the necessary mistresses of our dwellings, can best serve the state when they secure the greatest possible degree of health in their own homes. Dr. Farr prescribed the right remedy when he said, "Health at home is health everywhere." On the other hand the state must exercise parental control over its subjects, whether congregated in cities, villages, colleges, schools, institutions of charity, prisons or reformatories. Epidemics are to be treated as public enemies. They come in foul sewerage, polluted streams and corrupted wells of water They come as a thief in the night and steal away those jewels of the household, the little ones, whose lives are more precious than all the wealth of the state. THE REPORTING OF VENEREAL "It shall be the duty of every physician in this state, every superintendent or manager of a hospital or public institution in this state to immediately report to the local Board of Health every case of venereal disease which he is called upon to treat or which is in such hospital or public institution, and each and every physician, superintendent or manager of such hospital or institution shall make such reports as may be called for by the rules and regulations of the State Board of Health of this state, and must comply with all the rules and regulations made by said board to prevent the spread of venereal diseases. Provided, That the report of such venereal disease shall not include the name of the person afflicted." The State Board of Health has issued and placed in the hands of all registered physicians a blank form of report as follows: Report of Venereal Diseases. Remarks Name of Physician. NOTE.-Physicians are urged to explain the contagious principles of venereal diseases and the necessary precautions to be observed in the various |