George F. Dick

Studies on Pellagra Based on its Occurrence in 1910 in the Cook County Institutions at Dunning, Illinois

Pellagra has been recognized for almost 200 years as occupying an important place among the various diseases common to the countries in southern Europe, but it has been only within the past few years that it has been recognized in this country. In all probability the disease has been prevalent in various states, but it was not until the epidemic at the Alabama State Hospital in 1906, reported by Searcy in 1907, and the epidemic in the South Carolina State Hospital at Columbus in 1907 that the interest of the medical profession was aroused to the true situation. The activity of Babcock in his careful study of this epidemic combined with the interest taken by the State Board of Health resulted in bringing about the National Conference on pellagra at Columbia, S.C., November, 1909. This conference has been quite potent in stimulating not alone the medical profession but various state boards of health to active interest in the study of this disease which has always been considered peculiar to certain other countries and which is seen to be of wider distribution and greater importance than at first assumed.

On Institutional Dysentery

The etiology of asylum dysentery has been investigated in many instances in this and in other countries. In most cases the dysentery was found to be of the bacillary type. The cases reported by Vedder and Duval1 were mostly due to the Flexner type of bacilli, only a few Shiga bacillus cases being found. Fisher, in an epidemic at the Middle town Hospital for the Insane,2 found only bacilli of the Flexner type. In an epidemic at the Danvers State Hospital, Danvers, Massachusetts,3 bacilli of the Shiga type predominated. Only a few cases due to the Flexner bacillus were found.