To the Editor:—
In Tonics and Sedatives in The Journal,Dec. 9, 1939, you carry the following newspaper report, which was sent to you by a number of different correspondents:
PRYOR (Okla.) Oct. 31. (U. P.).—
Mrs. Homer Stout, 46-year-old farm woman whose case medical scientists had watched as the latest and perhaps the most thorough test yet of refrigeration treatment of cancer, died late today of a second affliction.Dr. Van Dolph Herrington announced after an autopsy that death resulted from a gallstone block of bile ducts that forced the fluid into Mrs. Stout's lungs and suffocated her.The fact that this item was picked up in so many different quarters and sent in to Tonics and Sedatives indicates, I presume, a widespread incredulity as to anatomic background for the reported diagnosis.In this connection, however, it may be well to remember that the condition of bronchobiliary fistula is