Nineteenth-century medical journals are not short of ghastly occupational injuries. Factories, building sites and the new railways were frightening places, and there is barely an issue of a major journal that does not contain at least one article about terrible accidents caused by inadequate safety arrangements in the workplace. But this example, published in the … Continue reading Death by barley
An X-ray vision
In December 1863 a New York physician, Samuel Ward Francis, sat down to write a letter to The Medical and Surgical Reporter. The medical achievements of Dr Francis – whatever they may have been – are forgotten today, but his work as an indefatigable amateur inventor lives on in the records of the US Patent Office. … Continue reading An X-ray vision
A chainsaw to the spine
In the early nineteenth century surgery was a primitive affair, generally limited to a few commonly performed operations. Most people know about agonising amputations, or the (possibly even more agonising) operations for bladder stones and mastectomy; others in the surgeon’s repertoire included basic procedures to remove cataracts or to release pressure in the skull. But … Continue reading A chainsaw to the spine
Spirits go straight to your head
I recently stumbled across this intriguing snippet in John Cooke’s A Treatise on Nervous Diseases (1824): I am informed by Mr. Carlisle, that “a few years since a man was brought dead into the Westminster Hospital who had just drunk a quart of gin for a wager. The evidences of death being quite conclusive, he was immediately examined; and … Continue reading Spirits go straight to your head
Broken glass and boiled cabbage
Here’s a case reported in the London Medical Gazette in 1839 which we must file under ‘unbelievably stupid things done by young men’. It comes originally from a book published in 1787 by Antoine Portal, a distinguished physician who was personal doctor to Louis XVIII, and the founder of the French Royal Academy of Medicine. He … Continue reading Broken glass and boiled cabbage
The eye fungus
My headline is somewhat misleading, for the ‘fungus’ referred to in today’s article, published in the Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal in 1823, has nothing to do with mushrooms. It’s a word which until the late nineteenth century was sometimes applied to certain forms of tumour. And in case you’re thinking that a story about eye … Continue reading The eye fungus
The man who peed a bullet
Gunshot wounds have always been a particular challenge for the medic. Some of the oldest surgical manuals contain advice on removing balls or bullets lodged superficially – it was often possible to remove missiles from soft tissue or bone near the skin. But if they had penetrated deeper into body cavities or damaged internal organs … Continue reading The man who peed a bullet
Cart to heart
In 1837 the Dublin Medical Journal published a short article by a Dr Lees entitled, simply, ‘Wounds of the Heart’. According to popular belief at the time, injuries to the heart were inevitably fatal, and often instantaneously. Many doctors still subscribed to this notion, but there was a growing body of evidence to the contrary. … Continue reading Cart to heart
Hip hip
On 18th January 1824 The Lancet reported an operation of extraordinary daring. It had taken place two days earlier at Guy’s Hospital in London, and the surgeon was the celebrated Sir Astley Cooper. At the age of 55 he was at the height of his powers, recently elevated to a baronetcy and basking in the … Continue reading Hip hip
A fishy business
In 1739 a surgeon from the village of Kelvedon in Essex wrote to the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society to communicate ‘three extraordinary cases’ from his practice. The first and last are separated by over thirty years, which makes me suspect – perhaps unkindly – that not much of medical interest took place in … Continue reading A fishy business