Column: Dr's Casebook" Dr Keith Souter: When doctors advised patients to eat biscuits for their health
Halloween is coming soon. I was reflecting on that only last night while drinking tea with a Halloween ginger biscuit that was adorned with a ghost. In keeping with the season, I was also reading a short story by Edgar Allan Poe. To my surprise the story sent me down one of those rabbit holes to do some research on biscuits and health.
The story was called The Purloined Letter, written by Poe in 1844. It features his detective C Auguste Dupin, a forerunner of Sherlock Holmes. Early in the story he talks about the famous doctor surgeon, John Abernethy (1764-1831). He was one of the founders of St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London, a president of the Royal College of Surgeons and for a time, surgeon to King George iii. I knew about him from my surgery days. He had a condition named after him, as well as a specific surgical technique, and surprisingly - a biscuit.
John Abernethy was ahead of his time for he thought that many conditions came about because of disordered digestion., and that treating this mal-digestion and dyspepsia with a wholesome diet could achieve restore health. He invented a ‘digestive biscuit’ which he advised his patients to take to support proper digestion. It is still popular today.
In 1839 two other doctors in Scotland came up with a recipe for digestive biscuits made from brown meal. I have tried unsuccessfully to find their names, but it seems they are lost to history. Their biscuits, however, were produced commercially by a famous firm and became a household name even to this day.
In the Georgian period the city of Bath was one of the most famous and elegant health resorts in Britain. Dr William Oliver (1695-1764) was a brilliant physician in that era. He was an early advocate of smallpox inoculation and an expert on gout. He settled in Bath, where he founded a hospital, which under Royal patronage became the Royal Mineral Water Hospital. It is today the Royal National Hospital for Rheumatic Diseases.
He also invented the Bath Bun, a rich, sweet bun that his patients adored. Unfortunately, he noticed that it also made them fat. So, scientifically minded doctor that he was, he experimented and produced the plainer, less fattening, Bath Oliver biscuit, which he prescribed as part of his treatment course. When he died he willed the recipe to his coachman, Atkins, together with a sack of flour. Atkins duly became rich and the Bath Oliver became famous.