Word: sulfa
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Without any real understanding of how sulfa-drugs overcome infections, doctors have been freely using them ever since Dr. Gerhard Domagk of Germany discovered prontosil, forerunner of sulfanilamide, in 1932.* But the mystery of their effectiveness has recently been cleared up by a series of discoveries reviewed in a recent issue of the British Medical Journal...
...typical case, a steelworker was horribly burned when molten metal filled his boot. After eight months of hospitalization and every type of conventional treatment from skin-grafting to sulfa drugs, his leg was still unhealed and infected, and he had a high fever. Several doctors decided that amputation was inevitable. Dr. Walsh took over and treated him with "Biodyne" ointment. In four months, the charred leg was good...
General symptoms are fever (usually 100°-103°), cough, chilliness, headache (often severe). Lung inflammation appears within the first few days but is seldom as extensive as in pneumonia. Sulfa drugs don't help the patient and sometimes increase a patient's misery. Treatment with pneumonia serums has also proved futile...
...railroadman should be allowed to work within one or two weeks after treatment with any drug of the sulfa group, warns the Association of American Railroads. These drugs often befuddle the mind, impair judgment. Sulfa befuddlement has caused at least one train wreck...
Pilots have long been forbidden to fly for at least four days after sulfa treatment. The American Medical Association urges anyone who has taken the drugs to wait several days before driving an auto, making important decisions or signing important papers...