is almost an exact copy of his combination-only more elegant— official in the United States Pharmacopoeia. Hence every physician should study the United States Pharmacopoeia, and for quick reference the reader is referred to the list of useful official drugs and preparations in Part II of this book.

The aim of prescription writing should be for efficiency (activity of an active, useful drug), for simplicity, and for compatability. Toward these ends one sees that the prescription writer, the physician, must know which are the useful drugs; must have an accurate knowledge of the activities of these drugs; must know which one, or more, meets the indication it is desired to meet; and must know the best preparation of the drug to use, the best combination in which to give it, and finally, the best method of administering it. The physician must also know the proper dose, the rate of absorption, the rate of excretion, and hence the proper frequency of the dose. Therefore, before one should write an individual prescription for a patient he must be fully trained to practice medicine.

The physician should always have a copy of his prescriptions, and a stub is better than a carbon copy, as on the stub may be written the size of each dose, with the name, age, and address of the patient, and the date. The main prescription may then be (after computing) written, signed and dated. The stub then kept becomes a record of the drugs and doses given such a patient at a given date.

The physician should write simple prescriptions of useful drugs in the best official preparation, and, if soluble, in the most agreeable solution possible. A pharmaceutical firm that offers a pleasant preparation of a disagreeable but valuable drug, or presents a purer valuable drug, should be commended, and such preparations should be used. Also, if a chemical firm offers a new synthetic or a purer alkaloidal product of a useful drug, and if such have been approved by the Council on Pharmacy and Chemistry of the American Medical Association, they should be used in suitable cases.

A large number of elaborate combinations are made and sold under different names to cover the taste of simple, useful, but disagreeable-to-take drugs. The physician should remember

that not always does sweetness make a bad tasting drug taste less disagreeable. Many a more or less nauseating drug is much better tolerated by dissolving it in a sour mixture, as in syrup of citric acid and water. Also, a drug dissolved in simple water may be added to fresh lemonade or orangeade. Peppermint has a very pleasant taste for most people, and as disagreeable a drug as potassium chlorate when used as a gargle, may be well dissolved in peppermint water.

Effervescing water, either simple carbonated, or better an alkaline water as vichy, is a pleasant method of administering many drugs, even insoluble powders; the powder is suspended, as bismuth for instance, by the air globules.

An oil like castor oil, or cod liver oil, may be disguised by placing a little salt in the bottom of a wineglass, then filling the glass half full with cold water without stirring to dissolve the salt, and then placing the oil carefully on top of the water. If this mixture is rapidly swallowed the only taste is that of the salt. Castor oil is variously disguised by the addition of a small amount of saccharin and a little oil of anise or oil of wintergreen, and may then be given in orangeade. Or, it may be further disguised by adding fluid extract of licorice.

The disagreeable taste of epsom salt may also be disguised by a little saccharin and oil of peppermint or wintergreen.

A pleasant method of administering many disagreeable drugs to children is to give them in a teaspoonful or tablespoonful of freshly made cocoa or chocolate. Or, a little sweetened chocolate may be crushed by the mother and given with the powder or solution.

EVOLUTION OF A PRESCRIPTION

While it is advised to write prescriptions as far as possible in English, it is also advised to use a few Latin abbreviations. The numerals used should always be in Arabic.

Same prescription with U. S. P. names, abbreviated:

S. A teaspoonful, in water, three times a day, after meals.

A pill should rarely contain more than 0.30 gram, and a 0.20 gram pill is better. In other words, a pill should not be large.

Capsules are often ordered instead of pills, and are frequently preferable, because they prevent the taste of disagreeable drugs, and because the drugs may be ordered in dry powder, and hence are more quickly absorbed after the capsule dissolves. To hasten solution or action, the cap may be taken off the capsule just before swallowing. Ordinarily a capsule should not contain more than 0.30 gram. Most pills, capsules and tablets should not be taken on an empty stomach, unless plenty of water is taken with them. Most tablets should be crushed with the teeth before swallowing.

Some drugs are well prepared and sold in elastic capsules, i.e., soft gelatin capsules. It has been shown that sometimes these soft capsules do not well dissolve, not as well as hard capsules. Hard gelatin capsules will dissolve in the stomach in five minutes, if there is no alcohol in the stomach. Soft gelatin capsules will generally not dissolve in pepsin solution at body temperatures until four hours or more, and may not dissolve at all. It is also uncertain how soon they will dissolve in the duodenal fluid, but if there is no desire for immediate action, flexible capsules will generally dissolve sooner or later in the alimentary canal and allow the activity of the drugs they contain.

If one or more drugs are to be given in a larger dose than 0.30 gram as a total weight, and a liquid preparation is unsatisfactory or inadvisable, the drugs should be given in powder, as follows:

If a rectal suppository is ordered, it should be remembered that generally the size for an adult represents a weight of 2 or

The drop is a measure belonging to no one system, and though it is inaccurate as an exact dose, it is a very useful dosage for many preparations. No official dropper for a patient or a nurse to use is more accurate than a simple drop from the bottle. Of course the size of the drop depends on the size of the bottle's mouth and the character of the liquid, but a tendrop dose to-day dropped from the same bottle of medicine to-morrow will pretty closely represent the same amount. As so many times stated, an absolutely accurate, unvarying dose of any preparation of any drug, prepared in any drug store, in any town, in any climate, for a patient with any disease, is impossible. The dose of any drug is the amount that will produce the effect desired; hence the dose should be increased if there is no action from it, and diminished if there is too much action.

A number of ointments are official.

or other ingredients may be added to them.

10 drops, in water, three times a day, after meals.

They may be combined