Among the more recent contributions to the antiseptic and antipyretic group, phenacetin is the most promising. Although without danger in the dosage necessary for therapeutic purposes, some persons suffer from the sweating, chilliness, and weakness, which occur in a greater degree when the other members of the group are used. The dose of phenacetin ranges from ten grains to thirty, in twenty-hour hours, and three grains every two, three, or four hours will have sufficient effect on febrile heat for the most part. It is little soluble in water, and is best given in wafer, capsule, or powder.

Comparing phenacetin with other well-known remedies of the same class, it is found that a dose of ten grains is equal to one of fifteen-grains of antipyrin, of quinine, and of kairin—to thirty grains of salicylate of soda and thirty grains of thallin. Dose for dose as compared with antifebrin (acetanilid), it is as effective in reducing heat, but the action is less prompt, and yet it endures longer.

The action that confers on phenacetin its antipyretic power is the change in the composition of the red blood-globules, whereby the oxidizing effect carried on by these bodies is lessened or arrested entirely. It is poisonous to animals, but not to man [Malmert, Dujardin-Beaumetz, and others].

Phenacetin is a remedy in rheumatismal affections of the first order. In fevers, as an antipyretic, and as an analgesic in painful affections, it is as useful certainly, if not more so, than any other of these remedies.