Coeur d'Alene evening press. (Coeur d'Alene, Idaho) 1907-1929, 1909-11-04
SURGICAL TRAGEDIES.
Mishaps That Follow In the
Wake OF Operations.
OBJECTS LEFT IN THE BODY.
Recorded Cases Show That Tubes,
Clamps, sponges, Towels and seis-
sors Have Been Forgotten or Over
looked Until Disclosed by Autopsy.

soFs Rave Been Forgotten or Over
looked Until Disclosed by Autopsy.
Accidents viii happen in the best reg
ulated OF operations. Foreign bodies,
such as forceps, sponges. towels and
gauze pads, are more frequently left In
the human body after operations than
the public IL aware Of. To DE sure The
number Of operations In which this
happens Is small. 1t occurs perhaps
once or twice in the course OF 1000
operations Like an eruption OF Vesu-
vius, however, II Is likely at any time
and has marked the operations of some
OF the best known surgeons Of this
city. They say II may occur again not.
withdrawing the number Of schemes
which have been devised to prevent II.
No one knows the number Of these
mlshaps, as only In relatively few cases
Is death followed by an autopsy. The
announcement that "the operation was
n success, but the patient died." may
cover multitude OF sins OF omission
and commission so far as any one can
tell. One may find In the files OF the
annals Of Surgery" the reports Of be-
tween $50 and 200 cases In which OBJ
tects used In operations have been left
In the body. These objects include
tubes, clamps, spOnges, towels. forceps,
scissors and finger rings. Usually It
IL piece OF gauze or sponge that is
left IN the wound. In 100 cases re.
ported from Europe thirty.one sponges
and thirty-three pieces OF gauze were
left In wounds. In forty-three cases
death resulted. In the other sixty-slx
cases the articles worked their way out
after remaining In the body for months
and sometimes years or were discover
ed and removed by operations perform
ed to relieve the pain caused by the
movements OF these objects.
In one case surgeon lost his seal
ring It finally pushed It's way to the
surface Of the body Of person on
whom be had operated and was re.
turned 70 Its owner, In another pair
OF forceps circulated about the abdom-
inal cavity Of ease" for four years
before beIng recovered. Pieces OF
gauze ave feet long aud yard wide
have been removed from persons on
whom operations had been performed
IL seems strange 10 the layman that
anything should be able 10 escape the
surgeon IN such II small cavity as Is
likely to be created Ia the body In the
course Of an operation Especially does
II seem impossible that anything should
be lost m view of the extreme care
taken TO prevent II Many surgeons
have worked out methods Of proce-
dure for operations with the intention
Of eliminating the possibility OF the loss
OF anything used Unfortunately even
these have never proved mfalllble,
The most usual method Is to have ey-
erythlng counted by Il nurse before
the operation begins, Before the wound
IL closed each article Is accounted for
BY recount. Some surgeons have had
experiences which led them to triple
the number u persons responsible for
the appliances, each 10 check, the counts
Of all the others Other surgeons have
the gauxe pads IN packages of half u
dozen or n dozen. Only one package
II opened III time. and It's contents
must be accounted for before the next
II opened. Tying tapes to each gauzc.
pad or Instrument inserted IN q wound
Is another precautlon A prominent
BROOKLYN surgeon devised check sys,
tenn similar 90 that used by baggage.
men. 4 quantity of glass checks We're
numbered, there hcing two OF each
numler. and to each set of duplicates
was attached a tape. To every article
nEel Ia the operation one of these
tapes with the check attached was fas.
tened Whenever for instance. piece
of gau1e was taken from a basin for
use one Ut the cheeks was removed
and placed Ia the BASIN Before the
wound was stitched each article rep
resented hy these detached checks had
10 he accounted for
Notwithstanding such precautions, In
four recorded cases large sponges were
torn In half while the operation was
IN progress and one of the halves
placed In the wound and lost sight OF.
When the count was made there was
the same number Of sponges as az the
beginning Of the operation. The miss.
ting half was forgotten and the wound
closed
"a surgeon IN describing one Of these
mlshaps says:
"A young surgeon, assisted by an
older surgeon, performed the operation.
The older one tore u sponge In half and
tucked half OF II IN without saying any.
thing about Il. The woman died Of
shock. and the sponge was removed at
the pOstmortem examination. much TO
the surgeons surprise. as count Of
sponges gave the number with which
the operation had been begun"
Another way IN which a reputable
surgeon may he made the victim OF
this kind Of an accident II illustrated
IN this settlement. made by an Ameri-
can practitioner:
II have had two unfortunate expert
enccs in regard 20 foreign bodies re-
naming in the abdominal cavity. one
occurring few years ago when using