Century of the Surgeon
If you like the notes, go ahead and buy the book!
- The author takes us on a journey through the most important discoveries in the 19th century surgery.
- We learn about the beginnings of asepsis and anesthesia, which from today’s point of view can both amuse and scared in a healthy way
- We find out a bit about how more methods of anesthesia were discovered: laughing gas, ether and chloroform
- We realize how different the world was just 150 years ago, where there was no plastic surgery yet, and it took several dozen years to make doctors aware that it was better to wash their hands before surgery
- Thorwald also familiarizes us with the arguments between surgeons, where the fight for being recognized was often more important than the discovery and its popularization
- We can find out what were the beginnings of success in kidney surgery, stomach tumors or removal of appendicitis
- The book first and foremost makes us aware of how much can change over a single century in the field, where, in spite of everything, some have already recognized the existence of certain unbridgeable boundaries. It is also a solid lesson of humility, which reminds that “science does not jump” but only takes small steps, and any shortcuts are usually paid for by failures
- The very form of the book is atypical, because it is a “reportage” dressed up in a story, with lots of dialogues and detailed descriptions of the characters. The narrator is Henry Steven Hartman, maternal grandfather of Thorwald, whose notes were the basis for writing the book
Notable figures
- Efraim McDowell (1771 - 1830) - physician and pioneer surgeon, first one who successfully removed an ovarian tumor
- John Collins Warren (1778-1856) - surgeon who helped organize first public demonstration of surgical anesthesia (by Morton)
- Horace Wells (1815 – 1848) - was a dentist who first experimented with nitrous oxide and effectively “first (..) discover and perform surgical operations without pain”
- Joseph Lister (1827 - 1912) - was a surgeon and one of the pioneers in antiseptic surgery. He Introduced carbolic acid (later named phenol) to sterilise surgery instruments and clean patients wounds.
- Ignaz Semmelweis (1818-1865) - famous of forcing antiseptic practices like chlorine hands washing