The Treatment of Septicemia and Local Infections by Intravenous Injections of Mercurochrome-220 Soluble and of Gentian Violet

In our first paper on mercurochrome-220 soluble,1 experiments were cited to show that it could be introduced intravenously in doses of 5 mg. per kilogram of body weight in rabbits and 10 mg. per kilogram in dogs, with impunity. In this paper we detailed a prolonged search which we had made with many old and new combinations of mercury and of dyes to find a germicide which would not coagulate albumin and was nontoxic. We showed that mercurochrome answered these requirements and could be used in wounds in a 1 per cent, solution. Our toxicity experiments were confirmed by Piper 2 on both animals and human subjects. His clinical results have been most striking. Later it was shown in our laboratories, by Hill and Colston3 that, after the intravenous administration of 1, 2.5, 5 and 10 mg. per kilogram of mercurochrome to normal rabbits, the urine became either bactericidal or strongly bacteriostatic for B. coli. This inhibitive action was strongest during the first five hours after injection. It was also shown that the increase in inhibitive action was not in direct proportion to increase in dosage, which can probably be explained by the fact that, with smaller doses, in rabbits from 1 through 5 mg. per kilogram, most of the drug is elimi¬ nated through the kidneys, whereas with higher doses there is diarrhea and intestinal elimination. The same authors 4 have shown that, after the intravenous admin¬ istration of mercurochrome to normal rabbits, the blood is strongly bacteriostatic for B. coli from fifteen through forty-five minutes after injection. In short, the direct action of mercurochrome is rapid : in the circulation, strongest the first hour, as is to be expected; in the urine, strongest the first five hours. Any indirect action