The Dolores star., 1916-09-22

London.-The marvellous progress
-...at has been made In recent times In
Vdrgical science Is most impressively
revealed by q journey to some Of the
larger military hospitals. made posi-
BILE through the courtesy Of Sir Alfred
Keogh. director general Of the army
medical service.
In all the hospitals what the medical
STAFF set above all Is conservative sur
gery-that Is to say. the saving OF
limbs In order that the patients may
remain useful members of the COM
munity. Thus. at the Herbert hospital.
at Shooters Hill, there have been
since the beginning Of the war from
three to four thousand operations. and
Colonel Simpson, the officer in charge,
had been in all more than IS primary
amputations.
The impression left by a tour OF
these hospitals upon the layman's mind
Is that outsiders have an utterly In
adequate Idea of the debt they owe
to modern surgery at time like the
present. Day by day the surgeons
are giving to the nation new men for
old. They have embarked upon
great mission of hope among the ma
tons soldiers. They are doing more
than would have been credible twenty
years ago to rob war of its ultimate
horror.
Out of the hundreds of wonderful
cases brought to ones notice during
these visits 1t is only possible to de-
scribe few that may be regarded as
typical of this trade Of mending SOL
dlers. Take first the new nerve sur
gerry. Here Is a man with bullet
hole near his collar bone which sew
cred the nerve controlling the muscles
of the wrist. The result was wrist
drop" and hand which until quite re-
Gently would have been regarded as
incurably useless. The two ends of
the severed nerve have been freed
from what had already become no
more than scar. they have been re-
united and there is every prospect that
in less than year tie hand will be
almost as good rs ever.
las simple as tying up the two ends
Of cut telephone wire" says the sur
geon who operated.
Amazing Nerve Cases.
There are more remarkable nerve
cases still. A man had part of the
fleshy portion of his arm shot away,
carrying with 1t four inches Of the
nerve necessary to control the hand
movements. The surgeon rang up sew
eral hospitals on the telephone till he
heard of what he wanted, the ampu-
tation that afternoon Of healthy limb.
The limb happened to be leg. and
it was amputated In the afternoon. No
sooner was it cut off than four or five
inches practically living nerve were
removed from the calf, placed In a
saline bath and rushed by taxi to the
other hospital. Here the patient was
already under an anesthetic. The
wound in his arm was opened with a
lancet, the ends Of the Indispensable
nerve quickly found and the circuit
re-established. as 1t were, by means OF
the first patients four inches of fila.
ment. Today the man Is In fair way
of regaining the full use of his hand.
Bone surgery on rather similar lines
Is more 1anlilar, out nardly less sur
prising when you meet and talk to a
man who converses with the aid Of q
lower jaw part Of which was only q
few weeks ago part Of his right leg
1t was mended with two and one hall
inches of one of his shin bones. The
shin has quite healed. and the hole
will be completely filed with new bone
before long. so accommodating Is ma
ture when treated with knowledge.
Another patient Is perfectly happy
and prosperous with three inches OF
the fbula of his left leg neatly NOR
tised in the humerus of his right arm
He too, will finally suffer no loss OF
bone whatever. The variants of sucf
operations are endless and only limited
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