Penicillin Treatment of Early Syphilis—A Preliminary Report

Abstract

Four [male] patients were treated with 1,200,000 units of penicillin given in a dosage of 25,000 units at 4-hr. intervals, day and night for 8 days. These patients were observed for a period sufficiently long to permit comparison with the results produced by more conventional forms of treatment. Studies of secretions collected from primary lesions were made at 4-hr. intervals after beginning treatment. No spiral forms were observed after the 16th hr. No symptoms, either early or late, were observed which could be construed as representing toxic response to the drug. A careful study of the serol. reactions as an index of the response to the treatment indicated that the therapy was responsible for a more or less rapid and complete disappearance from the blood stream of the reacting substance which is measured by the various tests and which is usually associated with activity in early syphilis. Further observations of the group of patients treated will be made over as long a period of time as possible. The prelim. results look hopeful, but, as pointed out by the authors, "the progress toward the adoption of a new mode of treatment must, of necessity, be deliberate.".