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Dear Editor:—In connection with the article on "Tryparsamide Therapy" by J. W. Lichtenstein (Arch.Dermat. & Syph.24:182 [Aug.] 1931), I should like to present two cases illustrating the dangers of placing too much reliance on tryparsamide as an antisyphilitic agent in certain types of neurosyphilis.
Case 1.—A man, aged 28, had been found to have a strongly positive Wassermann reaction of the spinal fluid and a first zone colloidal gold curve. He had been treated by means of tryparsamide, bismuth and mercury. During this treatment he noticed dimness of vision, and he was given sodium thiosulphate. Tryparsamide had been administered on the basis of a diagnosis of dementia paralytica for which there was no clinical support. It is probable that the case was one of early syphilitic meningitis that needed intensive antisyphilitic therapy rather than tryparsamide. Examination in our eye clinic showed chorioretinits. Sub