Interesting, Day. I pop up with this little story every now and then.
I suppose it's a Helicobacter pylori story - I used to work for the Prof who was head of department in Royal Perth where they did the original work on H.pylori. The bismuth stuff was involved in some trials. I happened to read The Forty-Nine Steps (John Buchan) while I was there, in which an American character who suffers an ulcer is always sucking bismuth tablets. By the end of the story he is free of his ulcer. I mentioned this to the Prof, and he was quite tickled by the circumstance. (They already had the cure half a century before . . . ) Rowena. I cured my ulcers permanently with Pepto Bismal. Bought large bottle and swigged it frequently for about a week...