Treatment of Human Puerperal Infections, and of Experimental Infections in Mice, With Prontosil

A Brief History of Great Discoveries in Pharmacology: In Celebration of the Centennial Anniversary of the Founding of the American Society of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics

“…In addition, Leonard Colebrook of Queen Charlotte's Maternity Hospital in London, an expert on the chemotherapy of streptococcal infections, successfully treated 60 women who had contracted the dreaded puerperal (postpartum) fever, and only three of them died (Colebrook and Kenny, 1936). This report, among others, alerted the medical establishment to the potential benefits of antibacterial chemotherapy, despite the prevailing dogma that chemotherapeutic agents would only render minimal beneficial effects against generalized bacterial infections.…”

Bromine, bear-claw scratch fasciotomies, and the Eagle effect: management of group A streptococcal necrotising fasciitis and its association with trauma

“…51 Whilst deaths of the wounded in the US army was 8.26% in the First World War, this decreased to 4.5% in the Second World War during which American soldiers were issued sulphonamide powder in first aid packs, along with improved surgical techniques. 52,61 Sulphonamide usage on wounds escalated from 1942, but rather than sprinkling, the drug was dumped in lumps on wounds, thereby reducing drug absorption.…”

The Formation of Methemoglobin and Sulfhemoglobin During Sulfanilamide Therapy

“…Colebrook and Purdie (14) noted cyanosis in 58 of 106 patients receiving sulfanilamide. Spectroscopic examination of the bloods in 53 of these cases showed methemoglobin in 24, sulfhemoglobin in 13, both sulfhemoglobin and methemoglobin in 8, and absence of abnormal heme pigments in only 8. Frost (15) has found sulfhemoglobinemia postmortem in a case treated with prontosil and benzylsulfanilamide.…”

“…Colebrook and Kenny (13) found that 3 of 38 patients treated with " Prontosil Soluble" developed sulfhemoglobinemia. Instances of sulfhemoglobinemia after the administration of sulfanilamide have been reported by Paton and Eaton (6) (5 cases), Archer and Discombe (8) (5 cases) and Evelyn and Malloy (11) (4 positive blood examinations).…”