SWISS SUN CURE.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4827, 30 March 1925, Page 2

SWISS SUN CURE.

SCHOOL AMONG THE MOUNTAINS. More than 20 years ago a. Swiss peasant who had cut his hand consulted' a young medical practitioner and was advised to expose the wound to the sunlight. The practitioner was Dr. Rollier, who is now famous for his sun treatment, of bone tuberculosis.

He had noted how rapidly and cleanly the wounds of the peasants healed in the bright, sunny atmosphere of the Swiss mountains. It was these observations that led him to try what sunlight could do' for bone tuberculosis.

He chose Leysin as the ideal spot for the experiment —a little mountain hamlet in tho High Alps at an altitude of 4500 ft on the southern slope ot the Tours d’Ai chain of mountains. Amongst the tuberculosis patients who came to him were hunchbacks (Pott’s disease), patients with large, unsightly glands on their necks, with bodies utterly twisted and deformed and covered with repulsive ulcers. Many of these unfortunate sufferers had been through operation after operation or had lain for months ni plaster casts.

Dr. Rollier banished the knife and the plaster cast. He exposed the diseased limbs to the sunlight, beginning with small “doses. Cures that seemed almost miraculous were effected, and soon the clinic became known and patients came from .all parts <of the world. The work started in a modest little chalet is now carried on in 34 clinics, built with balconies perfectly adapted to sun treatment, and there are 800 patients, adults and children, who are benefiting, and the larger proportion absolutely cured. Amongst woods and pastures on a picturesque site at Cergnat, a few miles from Leysin, Dr. Rollier has established the school in the sun—preventorium, he calls it—-where, children predisposed to phthisis, with enlarged glands, anaemia, or rickets, are educated.

At the present time there are children of ten nationalities at the school. The recent arrivals are still fairly pale, but the three-months pupils are already well tanned, and those who have been at'ihe school for over a year are a deep copper bronze. The children always do their lessons in the open air ; on wet days they sit in an open shed and on fine days they go out with a teacher, carrying light folding desks and chains with them, and choose a beautiful spot in the midst of the glistening snowcapped mountains. The only garments they wear are bathing drawers, and they sit. with the sun shining on their baclfts. The action of the sun’s rays produces muscular development, and prevents lateral curvature of the spine.

One hour a day is spent in gymnastics. dumb-bells, and breathing exercises. Close to the!, school a little agricultural colony has been started for children consisting of two chalets and a living chalet. It ig directed by a former patient, who has been completely cured of Potts diseatse. The students are convalescents from bone tuberculosis, and delicate children predisposed to tuberculosis sent straight from the se;a. level. They attend the school in the sun so as to continue their education at the same time as they build up their bodies : and instead of being doomed to die young, or linger for yeans bedridden, they become vigorous and useful members of the community.—“ Westminster Gazette.”