Tuberculosis in relation to measles and other infectious diseases: a study of the intra-dermal tuberculin test

Abstract

Medicine being an Art as well as a Science, it is liable to reflect numan ta.ilins and foibles, one. of whicn is the weakness for a "fashion'. it may be said that of the various tuberculin tests, the one associated with von Pirquet's name has been the fashionable one.

Recently, however, the intra-dermal method or Mendel and Mantoux has bid fair to supplant the scarification test in popularity. If it is going to prove fashionable, it occurred to one that it might be of service to investigate its possible fallacies, particularly in relation to the acute infectious diseases.

Although the physician may be prone to "fashion" in technique, he is also a slave to dogma. A positive statement in medicine often acquires the authority of an established principle.

One such principle has been that tuberculosis is particularly liable to ensue after certain acute infectious diseases. Accordingly adopting the latest "fashion" in tuberculin tests, I set out as a devout believer to assess the value or the test in mitigating this grave sequel of events.