I. Donath. Treatment of progressive paralysis with nucleic acid injections. Die Behandlung der progressiven algemeinen Paralyse mittels Nukleinsaüire—Injectionen. Algem. Zeitschr. fur Psychiatry. bd. LXVI, S. 421, 1910

Based on the assumption that toxic metabolic products play an important role in the origin of many of the symptoms observed during progressive paralysis, Donath in 1903 proposed the use of subcutaneous injections of saline saline in the treatment of progressive paralysis. The results obtained turned out to be very favorable and led the author to the idea of using not a simple saline solution, the action of which is limited to the fact that it helps to remove harmful metabolic products from the body, but to find some substance that, by enhancing the oxidation processes, would make it possible to destroy those in blood toxins. Kochovsky tuberculin, proposed for this purpose by Pilcz, has the disadvantage that injections can lead to an exacerbation of a torpid tuberculous process, the existence of which until then was not manifested in any way. As a result, the author settled on a nucleic acid, the subcutaneous injection of which results in significant leukocytosis, accompanied by an increase in temperature by 11/2-1°; in some cases a more significant increase is also observed, so that the temperature can reach 40 °.