[Footnote 138: Fagge's, 26.2 per cent.; Greenhow's, 35; Warner's, 33.6; Owen's, 30.2; Hood's, 18.8; Coupland's, 35.3; Broadbent's, 16.6; Powell's, 18.7; total, 214 ÷ 8 = 26 per cent.] [Footnote 139: Hood's, 5.4; Warner's, 14.9; Owen's, 27.6; total, 47.9 ÷ 3 = 16 per cent.] [Footnote 140: _The Liverpool Med.-Chirurgical Journal_, July, 1881, p. 101.] 3. Authorities are generally agreed that the salicyl compounds do not arrest or control rheumatic inflammation of the endo- or pericardium or pleura, or subdue the pyrexia, if these complications in well-marked degree exist; and there is strong evidence to show that they do not at all constantly prevent the disease from involving those organs, even after the articular affection has subsided under their use. Inestimable as is the benefit conferred by these remedies in promptly relieving the articular pain and fever, they do not secure the great desideratum in the treatment of acute articular rheumatism--protection of the heart. In 352 cases treated with salicylate of soda at the Westminster Hospital, heart disease developed in 13.6 per cent.; in 267 treated without the salicylate, heart disease developed in 14.2 per cent. (Warner's cases).[141] In 350 cases treated with salicylates at Guy's, heart complications obtained in 68 per cent., while in 850 treated without them, the cardiac complications occurred in 58.8 per cent. (Hood).[142] Gilbart-Smith collected a large number of cases from several of the London hospitals, and analyzed them with the following results: Of 1727 cases of acute rheumatism treated before the introduction of the salicyl compounds, the proportion of cardiac complications was 54.4 per cent.; in 1748 cases treated subsequently to their introduction, the cardiac affections obtained in 63.4 per cent.; and in 533 cases treated by the salicyl compounds, those affections obtained in 68.4 per cent.[143] [Footnote 141: _The Lancet_, ii., 1881, 1080.] [Footnote 142: _Ibid._, ii., 1881, 1120.] [Footnote 143: _Ibid._, i., 1882, 136.] These facts certainly seem to prove that the salicyl compounds do not prevent the occurrence of the visceral complications or manifestations of acute articular rheumatism; and if space permitted instances might be quoted from many authors in which either endo- or pericarditis or pleuritis or pneumonia or other visceral manifestation had set in after the patient had been taking the salicylates long enough to have produced their usual physiological effects; some of these will be mentioned under the next section. It may be objected that in the above estimates sufficient attention has not been paid to the period of the disease at which the treatment by the {54} salicylates was begun, the time it was continued, the doses given, the age of the patient, the severity and other characters of the illness, such as whether acute or subacute, first or second attack, complicated or not.