Chemotherapy and Heparin in Subacute Bacterial Endocarditis

Comment by Saul R. Kelson, M.D., New York, and Additional Note by Drs. Porter and White In 1939 Kelson and White1published a preliminary report from the Massachusetts General Hospital on the treatment of bacterial endocarditis with chemical agents and heparin. In their original group there were two apparent recoveries out of 7 patients treated, a proportion of favorable results which was sufficiently encouraging to warrant testing out the method in a larger group of cases. In order to make the series as large as possible it was arranged to pool the experience of several clinics in Boston for a year beginning in the fall of 1939, using a more or less uniform therapeutic technic and giving the heparin to about half the patients, in order to assemble control cases for comparison with those heparinized. The present report is the result of this joint study undertaken by Drs. Leach, Porter