By this term is meant a proprietary preparation of iron and albumin, the discovery of which we owe to Schmiedeberg and Marfori. It is an organic preparation, and exists preformed in the liver and other parts of animals.

Ferratin is a reddish-brown powder, odorless and tasteless, and contains about 7 per cent of iron. It is not a mechanical mixture of iron salts with albumin, but a genuine chemical combination. The dose ranges from 5 to 15 grains, and is best given in powder, wafer, or capsule. In children it may be suspended in milk. A solution may be made with the aid of sodium bicarbonate, and this presents some advantages in certain states of the stomach and some forms of disease.

Ferratin is a combination of iron of special utility in that it is prepared for assimilation both primary and secondary. It is readily taken and well borne by children and fastidious adults, and as a chalybeate is both prompt and efficient. As it is already in combination with albumin, it is especially adapted to the formation of red-blood globules and should therefore be employed when the relative proportion of them is too low. It has the advantage of all other preparations of iron, that they must be converted into this before being absorbed. In anaemia, chlorosis, convalescence from acute diseases, chronic cardiac and renal diseases with anaemia, and in nervous affections, it has been found most effective. That ferratin is taken up in the structure of the blood and tissues is apparent in the fact that no portion of that taken, nor any product thereof, escapes by the kidneys. (Schmiedeberg, Marfori, G. See, and others.)

Haemol. Haemogalol

Kobert has recently brought forward two new preparations of iron, obtained by the action of reducing agents on the blood. They are compounds of iron and albumin—intermediate between haemoglobin and haematin. They are proposed for use in anaemia, chlorosis, in convalescence from acute diseases, and in conditions of depression where a restorative is needed. The dose ranges from 5 to 15 grains. (Kobert, Lang, Weiss, and others.)

Authorities referred to:

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1871, p. 181.

Barker, Dr. Fordyce. Puerperal Diseases, New York, 1874, p. 183.

Barnes, Dr. Robert. A Clinical History of Diseases of Women, London, 1873, p. 185.

Bucknill and Tuke. Manual of Psychological Medicine, third edition, London, 1874, p. 764.

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Ibidem, 1872, p. 523, Eisengehalt verschiedener vegetabilischer und thierischer Sub-stanzcn.

Lussana, Prof. von Ph. Lo Sperimentale, October, 1872, Schmidt's Jahrbücher der gesammten Medicin, vol. clvi, p. 262.

Nothnagel, Dr. Hermann. Handbuch der Arzneimittellehre, Berlin, 1870, p. 411, et seq.

Pokrowsky, Dr. W. Virchowys Archiv, vol. xxii.

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Taylor, Dr. A. S. On Poisons, third English edition, 1875, p. 484.

Trousseau et Pidoux. Traité de Thérapeutique et de Matiére Médicate, tantieme édition, art. Fer.

United States Dispensatory, thirteenth edition.

Waldenburo und Simon. Handbuch der allgemeinen und speciellen Arzneiverordnungs Lehre, achte Auflage, 1873.

Woronichin, Dr. N. Wien. med. Jahrbuch, xv, Schmidt's Jahrbücher der gesammten Medicin, vol. cxxxviii, p. 288.