Medical care/patent medicines

As much as we lament the FDA approval process, the exorbitant costs of medical care, insurance and the like.  Medical care has come a long way in 120 years.  In 1899, the year that this ad appeared, there was no regulation of medical doctors, medicine, or hospitals, the patient was at the mercy of luck.

 Here is an ad for a cure for pain by magnets and a school of medicine--I have never heard of either but these sort of things proliferated, every town had it's own patent medicine, Topeka's best known was Gavitt's https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/patent-medicines/12165

One of my favorite books on the history of hospitals is Bellevue https://www.amazon.com/Bellevue-Centuries-Medicine-Americas-Hospital-ebook/dp/B01A4ATWJU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1536403406&sr=8-1&keywords=Belleview.   

The following ad appeared in the Plaindealer in November of 1899.  This is something that I will go back to.