The contents of this book formed the subject matter of a report to the International Conference on Goiter held at Berne in August, 1927.
In the introduction, he discusses the normal physiology of the thyroid and its response to heat, cold, altitude, puberty and other factors, and emphasizes here as throughout the book that too much stress has been laid on deficiency of iodine as the dominant factor in enlargement of the thyroid of the adenomatous type. The two types of simple goiter—adenoma parenchymatous and diffuse colloid—he believes differ in their epidemiology and etiology. Deficiency of iodine may play an important rôle in colloid goiter. His studies, made in India, were almost entirely on the adenoma parenchymatous type. He believes deficiency of iodine is not the important etiologic factor. His experimental work on both animal and man, all of which has been previously published, suggests the presence of some toxic