Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1916-12-31
Sterling HeiGg Visits Dr. Carr@ps Wonderful War
Hospital, Few Miles From German Front i'm France

pierced with numerous little holes
to irrigate the entire wound in all its
parts. The little branch tubes reach
everywhere. inside the wound, where
microbe germs can be. Then the wound
dages remain soaked with the steriliz-
ing liquid.
Also, naturally. there is a cut of.
Otherwise. the flowing liquid. at con-
ampouie, would inundate the bed. This
cut-off is a spring clip which pinche s
the main rubber tube at convenient
height within nurses reach.
infection. does the rest There is no
fever battle. All the powers OF the
blood go to rebuilding.
Upstairs, in the laboratories, Nine.
Carrel showed US photographs of
wounds She is proud of her natural
color Photographic slides OF wounds.
projected on a screen
Here is. perhaps. the queerest thing
of all.
1t is the domain of the French cow
boy and st. Cyr graduate. who is a pro-
found mathematician. Lecomte du Nouy.
smooth-faced. boyish- giant. laugh
ing. chummy. as easy as an old shoe.
full of gigglng stories, and. seemingly.
more interested in foot ball than in the
high regions of integral calculus. in
which he worked out "by intuitive
processes" kboard formula which
makes me giddy just to look at.
From the beginning" said DR.. Car
rel. when the new patient was still on
the table, we began by measuring his
wound. both in surface and depth. Now
we do it. not for research. but for prac-
teal healing"
1t happened thus:
These men Of meticulous research
were always measuring the wounds at
different periods of progress. One day
Dr. Carer handed to Lecomte du Nouy
a bundle of such data.
There seems to me- said Carrei, to
be a mathematical relation. perhaps,
some here in these things between the
size Of the wound. the time of it's heal
ing and the patients age. See " you
can find an equation.
The one-time cowboy drew his abscis-
and ordinates. his perpendiculars and
horiZontals. making little even squares
down which he could plot curve, be-
ginning high up at the maximum size
of the wound when received and the
beginning of the time OF treatment. The
size of the wound. when deep. is meas
ured by the volume OF water which it
can contain. like a cup.
Plotting his data case by. case du Nouy
discovered that already in the third and
fourth Gay OF irrigation, OF perhaps the
fifth or sixth. the general direction of
the curve of healing had become clear.
and by comparing in great quantities
of cases the difference between the
progress Of healing in men of different
ages. he found. as fixed rule. that be-
tween twenty and thirty. no matter what
the constitution and antecedents of the
patients might be. the healing took SO
much quicker curve than say. between
thirty and forty. that a ''coefficient of
age" must positively exist
Youth will he served,
The cicatrisation of wound" says
Dr. Carrel, lis a function Of the size of
the wound and the age of the patient"
Before du Nouy arrived at simple
algebraic formula which any hospital
doctor can use he had to go through a
quantity of comic sections and integral
calculus. but this he keeps for the saga
cious and the formula or indication how
to make the curve of wounds healing is
as practical as the ordinary method fol-
lowed by physicians for recording the
temperature Of fevers.
logical theory of the growth and power
of life itself.
How is it used. practically?
So easy! For each wounded man they
red ink. It is done in advance. after
five. six or eight days irrigation. SO
they can predict two months In advance
the exact day when his wound should
heal with q dry scar.
Then day by day, beside the ideal
curve. they line the curve Of actual prog
ress in black ink. The two curves ought
to coincide. If the black curve of fact
begins to get away from the red curve
of biology, they know there's surely
something wrong with the treatment.
They hunt for the wrong thing. 1t
may be a bad compress. a bad position
in the bed. clothing too light. improper
nutrition. or even, possibly, bit of in
fected clothing, almost microscopical,
hidden in some deep fold of the wound
1t must be something-and they always
find, 1t.
Then, again. the black curve of fact
catches up and runs beside the rosy
curve of theory. like two trotting horses
hitched together to buggy with pneu-
matte tires.
And they can tell the wounded man:
ION Sunday. January 2S, 1917, your
wound will heal with dry scar"
a STERLING HELLO.