As a physician who was involved in treating tuberculosis before the introduction of chemotherapeutic drugs, I found the article by Earl Hershfield on the treatment of tuberculosis most enlightening.1 I left the tuberculosis field when it seemed as if these drugs were going to revolutionize therapy, as they have to a great extent.
However, it seems that now we are facing an onslaught by drug-resistant bacilli. It may well be time for phthisiologists to look at the older treatments, such as collapse therapy by artificial pneumothorax and pneumoperitoneum, thoracoplasty, phrenic nerve crush and the old standby, prolonged bed rest. Perhaps some of us older physicians may be called on to help, while we are still around and remember how these treatments were carried out.
Reference
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