DANGERS OF INTRODUCING IODIZED OIL INTO THE TRACHEOBRONCHIAL SYSTEM

Abstract

It is a matter of common observation that the advent of a new therapeutic or diagnostic measure may be accompanied by such a wave of enthusiasm in its favor that its field of acceptance and application early becomes extended beyond limits that are warranted by knowledge of its potential advantages or drawbacks—a knowledge which at first is inevitably incomplete. And it is not otherwise with the procedure indicated in the title of this paper. The truth of this reflection is being gradually attested in the rapidly increasing volume of the literature on this subject. One of us,¹for instance, has already published two papers on the use of lipiodol, in the first of which his attitude was unreservedly favorable, while in the second, with larger experience, he urged caution in cases of tuberculosis. In the main, the articles hitherto published²emphasize the advantages of the method, though of