Letters Sent to Dr. Herman Schlundt, September 10, 1928

September 20,1928. Dr. Herman Schlundt, University of Missouri, Columbia, Mo. Dear Dr. Schlundt: The letter written while you were in Michigan, as well as the one after you had returned to the University have both been received, and I mast apologize for not having acknowledged them before. However, it was necessary for me to make a hurried trip south, and I jumb returned the first part of this week. I found it rather warm down there and the trip exceeding- ly dirty. Am glad to note that you thoroughly enjoyed your trip in Northern Michigan, and don't doubt but that you felt very much rested after your rather strenuous two weelce in our city. I received a letter from Dr. Flinn this morning in which he states he has had a communication from you with reference to further data regarding the radio-active content of excreta. Dr. Flinn seems to be of the opinion that this data is essentially qualitative, and it would be difficult to interpret it on a quantitative basis, even though more exact weights of escretia had been kept on both the Dunn and Dumschott cases. At first I rather felt that the more detailed quantitative was data essential, but upon giving the matter some thought I am rather inclined to agree with Dr. Flinn's attitude. If it were possible to hospitalize a patient for a con- siderable period (30 days), and follow the ambunt eliminated in excretia carefully over that period, such data might be of value, but where a few intermitent specimens are examined, I hardly believe that it constitutes sufficient information to varrant drawing any conclusions from. This line of reason applies to my particular case, as you can realize it would be quite impractical to collect all excretia over a prolonged period of time under the present conditions. The only time that such a procedure would be feasible would be as previously suggested, that of dealing with a hospitalized patient. A few intermittent somples would not contain any pertinent information except to verify the presence of radio-active materials in the particular patient in question. I hope you will agree with Dr. Flinn's and my attitude in this matter. It seems almost out of the question to try and speculate as to the rate of elimination by determination of the materials in the excretia. The better method by far would be to keep a careful gamma ray check of the patient as time progresses, and thereby determine whether there is a decrease in the amount contained.