DYNAMICS OF THE ACTION OF PENICILLIN

Abstract

PENICILLIN now has almost reached the status of a panacea in medical therapy. Its value has been documented so completely that no further proof of its efficacy in the treatment of many bacterial infections is necessary, and the relative convenience of methods for its administration has been progressively more emphasized. Oral administration of penicillin has on the whole not fulfilled the expectations and has remained an expensive, wasteful and unreliable method. The vehicle proposed by Romansky¹ (peanut oil containing 4.8 per cent beeswax) has been found effective in maintaining penicillin blood levels for twenty-four hours after a single injection and has to some extent replaced aqueous solutions of penicillin in medical practice. In spite of these advances the mechanism of the action of penicillin is still not entirely known. There is ample clinical evidence to show that sufficiently large doses must be given and that injections of simple