Before the value of a drug can be determined in the relief of a symptom or symptoms or in the curing of a disease, certain facts as to dosage and method of administration must be ascertained, and controlled methods of study must be instituted. This is particularly true of a drug like digitalis, in which the dosage, the rate of absorption and the rate of elimination can be studied only biologically.
Almost none of these facts were known about digitalis until 1915. During that year Eggleston1 showed that in adults with heart failure, the average dose in terms of milligrams of powdered leaf is 0.15 cat unit2 per pound of body weight. He stated that this was an average, and that there is an average range of approximately 15 per cent above and below. Some of his cases showed a much higher, others a much lower, variation. Pardee