An Apple a Day.
The distinguished President of the “New Health Society” has issued a brief practical volume bearing the unusual title An Apple a Day, which is the first half of the saying “An Apple a Day keeps the Doctor Away”. Sir Arbuthnots ideal is that the medical profession should be interested more in prevention than in cure, that most diseases should be cure before they have begun.
The volume is divided into fourteen chapter headed: “Infancy,” Childhood,” “On Growing Up.” “On Growing Old,” “Constipation: The Disease of Disease,” “Bilious Attacks,” “Nasal Colds and Catarrh,” “Rheumatism,” “Neuritis”, “Headaches,” “Eye-Strain,” “Diseased Tonsils and Adenoids,” “Asthma,” “Bronchitis.”.
Sir Arbuthnot is a man full of years and of experience, the Nestor among surgeons and he is not only a prince of surgeons but a physician, which means a student of nature, of the greatest eminence. He is now in his eightieth year and he looks, walks and behaves like a man of fifty. He is most excellent advertisement for his methods of livings and his advice is eminently worth listening to.
He has the great merit of having drawn attention unceasingly in countless address and publications to then danger or intestinal stasis, in plain English, chronic constipation, but his horizon is by no means limited to the fouling of the blood stream from a bowel filled with putridity.
The fourteen chapters of this little book are immensely practical and they should appeal to every reader of this magazine. It is, however, to be regretted that the distinguished writer is not acquainted with the wonderful curative work which can be done by the infinitely small doses of homoeopathy. His recommendations for treatment are allopathic. He relies for curative purposes on surgery and orthodox medicine if prevention, dietetic and other natural treatments should fail.
He is not aware that homoeopathy can successfully treat numerous diseases and disorders which prove quite intractable to orthodox medicine. Readers of this journal should bear this in mind in reading the fascinating volume of this great pioneer, whose memory will be honoured for generations of the people and into the minds of the medical profession. It would perhaps be fairest to the eminent author, to the readers of this magazine and to the publishes, to give and extract which will show the nature of this book. We read under the heading.
“BILIOUS” ATTACKS.
“During middle age there is no organ of the human body which is subject to more abuse than the liver. How often do we hear our well-fed, middle-aged friends proclaim against the iniquisities of this organ, and how often are we treated to a vehement discourse on the havoc which it is inflicting on their health and happiness! Liverishness would appear to be the bane of middle life, and there can be no question that it is remarkably prevalent. In evidence of this we have only to bear in to cure an erring liver. This subject is therefore one of some importance from the health point of view and deserves our close attention.
First, we must decide whether the liver is genuinely entitled to all the blame that is thrust upon it, whether, in fact, liverishness and bilious attacks are fundamentally dependent upon the peccant ways of this organ. This immediately leads us to a consideration of the functions of the liver. During the processes of digestion, various substances are formed in the intestine which are harmful to the body cells and must, therefore, be got rid of by the excretory organs, chiefly the kidneys, as soon as possible.
Now it is part of the work of the liver cells to transform these deleterious products in such a way that they can bee safely excreted. But the liver has a limited capacity as a waste destroyer. Should there be an excessive amount of harmful substances, a certain quantity eludes the beneficent action of the liver and escapes unchanged into the general blood circulation.
In consequence, the most sensitive cells of the body, those of the brain, express their annoyance at the poison floating in the blood stream by producing a feeling of irritability and depression, while the other functions of the liver are also deranged and digestive symptoms of varying severity, which are popularly included in the category of Liverishness, arise. As it is the intestines which are the source of the poisons which disorganize the liver, it is not this organ which is primarily to blame.
The liver does it best and caries the extra responsibilities so often thrust upon it for surprisingly long periods, but naturally there is a limit to its powers of endurance, and this limit is most frequently reaches during middle age. We must, therefore, look for the real cause of the trouble in the intestines, and we find that chronic constipation, coupled with unwise dietetic habits, are the root cause of this most prevalent form of liver disturbance.
It may seem to some that, in constantly indicting constipation as the fount of most of the ills to which human beings are subject, I stretch the point. Admitted that with certain diseases the causal relationships are by no means simple, but in the case of the liver disorders we are discussing it requires but little knowledge of physiology to appreciate how the poisons produced during constipation, if the excess, must inevitably cripple the organ designed to destroy them. Of course, there are other designed to destroy them.
Of course, there are other factors. We have seen that such functional disorders of the liver are most prevalent during middle age. First, because, as already indicated, it is at this time of life that the devitalizing effects of chronic constipation upon the liver cells are sufficiently pronounced to disturb the function of that organ, and, secondly, because there is the temptation, which middle-age prosperity often brings, to relax from the discipline of keeping fit. It is notorious indulgent in matters of diet and drink.
Many a man or woman who has toiled industriously and followed the laws of health conscientiously through the strenuous period of their lives lapses badly a good time, to taste the fleshpots before the keenness of this appetite has waned; to let himself go, just for a year or two, of course. He will put the brake on later, but meanwhile he will eat, drink and be merry.
This is the way middle-age liverishness and biliousness. The habitual eating or rich, sweet, and greasy foods, with the consumption of alcoholic liquors (especially should they be combined with sugar), inevitably impose a strain upon the liver already disorganized by the associated constipation. This takes place all the more readily if the blood is insufficiently oxygenated from confinement in a hot, ill-ventilated room and from deficient open-air exercise.
In consequence, the secretion of bile, a fluid essential for the digestion of fats, is disturbed: stomach and intestinal digestion is upset, and the net result is what is popularly called a bilious attack. The chronically liverish person presents unmistakable symptoms. Breakfast has no interest for him, but he is inclined to make up for this later by eating a large rich meal. Naturally, for some time afterwards he feels sleepy, disinclined for effort, and suffers some degree of gastric discomfort.
During the working day there is nearly always a certain irritability of temper and depression of spirits, which makes the liverish person very difficult to live with. Headaches, palpitations and attacks of giddiness are frequently complained of. The tongue is more or less permanently coated and the bowels are costive. Often the eyes exhibit a slightly yellowish tinge.
Such a chronic state of ill health may persist indefinitely, but nearly always it is punctuated by acute bilious to cold after the body has been heated, but the more usual cause in what we may euphemistically call a dietetic indiscretion. By this I mean too free indulgence in an elaborate dinner or many courses or in alcohol. There is no difficulty in recognizing the postprandial bilious attack.
The morning after the victim is seized with a feeling of weight and uneasiness in the region of his liver. He has a headache, the tongue feels dry and rough, a bitter taste is experienced in the mouth, and there is a sensation of nausea, which culminates in vomiting, the vomit being bilious in character. The attack varies in duration from one to three days, and there is generally a subsequent feeling of languor and depression which may last for some considerable time.
Now, it is highly unfortunate that the sufferers from this type of bilious attack are apt to take their malady lightly. They come to regard it as one of the inevitable penalties of their age and consider that the pleasures to be derived from food and drink more than compensate for the subsequent ill-effects. They are sure to consult their physician and demand a remedy for their liver.
They are annoyed if certain restrictions in their ways of life are suggested: they demand a bottle of medicine, a pill or a powder, and too often the doctor is compelled to yield to their entreaties. They obtain a certain temporary, relief, but, continuing their indiscretions, the bilious attacks recommence and become more intense. Meanwhile the liver cells are being slowly and surely disorganised. Poisons are accumulating in the blood stream. The kidneys are being damaged in their efforts to rid the body of them.
Lane pioneered internal fixation of displaced fractures, procedures on cleft palate, and colon resection and colectomy to treat "Lane's disease"—now otherwise termed colonic inertia, which he identified in 1908—which surgeries were controversial but advanced abdominal surgery.
In the early 1920s, as an early advocate of dietary prevention of cancer, Lane met medical opposition, resigned from British Medical Association, and founded the New Health Society, the first organisation practising social medicine. Through newspapers and lectures, sometimes drawing large crowds, Lane promoted whole foods, fruits and vegetables, sunshine and exercise: his plan to foster health and longevity via three bowel movements daily.