10

water and coloured red. Two drams of this mixture are usually
given every four hours until sleep has been induced, then one
dram often enough to maintain the desired state of somnolence.
Constipation must be guarded against and a daily enema must be
given. If the proper amount of the drug is given the patient
can be aroused, taken to the bathroom, fed, given another dose
of medicine, following which he promptly goes to sleep again.
The results obtained with this type of therapy in manic
and depressed patients are quite encouraging. The patients
awake almost refreshed and rested, with considerable gain
in weight and a completely new out-look of life. By this method
patients are made to sleep from 16 to 20 hours a day. The treat-
ment in the first instance can be continued for ten days and later
it may be extended up to a month. During the year under
review eight schizophrenic and Manic Depressive Psychosis type
patients were selected for this treatment. Our results so far
are encouraging and will be published in our next Annual
Report when the treatment is tried on a large number of cases.
The treatment is not free from danger and the complications
to be guarded against are :—

(1)  Fever and Diarrhœa.

(2)  Pneumonia.

(3)  Cysto-pylo-nephritis.

When a complication occurs the drug must be stopped
at once and the patient may be treated according to the
symptoms.

(d) Treatment of Epilepsy by Dilantin Sodium.—The latest
reports on the treatment of epilepsy by Dilantin Sodium in
medical literatures were fascinating and I therefore, decided to
try this drug with my epileptic patients of which we have a large
number. This drug is reputed to be very efficacious in reducing
the frequency and severity of fits in epileptics although no claim
has been made for a complete cure of this fell disease by the drug.
Those who are in daily touch with such unfortunate patients can
only realise what it means to an epileptic when the frequency and
severity of his fits are reduced by a drug. Fight such patients
were selected for this treatment during the year under review and
Messrs. Parke Davies and Company, Limited, very kindly supplied
free of charge Kapseals Dilantin Sodium in sufficient quantity
for our experiment. Our results with this drug so far are
extremely encouraging and we shall publish our results in our
next report when we have tried this drug on a fair number of
patients.