Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1919-01-06
(From New York Times.)

The war has taught US how to save
more lives than the war has cost"
This is a statement made by Major
George A. Stewart of the War Dem
onstration Hospital of the Rockefeller
Institute for Medical Research, who
believes that out of the agony and
suffering Of the recent great struggle
will come benefits to humanity that
will compensate to a large extent for
the lives that were lost and the blood
that was shed. Medicine and surgery
lave taken giant strides during the
more than four years of war, and the
pressing necessity born through the
worlds travail, has, in the estimation
science to such an extent that man
kind will be a gamer rather than a
loser in the years to come.
The countless improvements of
practice, both in medicine and
surgery, made in this war have adj
vanced our science half a century in
four years. say Major Stewart. In
surgery, the values and technique Of
'chlorination'-or the use of some
combination of chlorine for the de-
%struction of malignant germs which
gave rise to pus-have been learned
as before. There is no longer
any good excuse for persistence of
puS.
THE development of the 'Carrel-
Dakin' method of treating all manner
of infected Wounds by periodic irriga-
ton with Dakin fluid Ca non-caustic
hypochlorite) marked an extraor-
binary advance. And in this the
method is as important as the fluid.
It is being taught to surgeons the
world over.
"Out of forty-five patients in the
War Demonstration Hospital suffer-
ing from empyema WI returned thir-
ty-five to the front Empyema is pus
in the chestcavity. 1t often follows
pneumonia, and hitherto has been
highly fatal. There has been an I'M
usual amount of empyema in New
York this year of a very serious type.
But the death rate has been lessened
by the modern treatment.
"Other wonderful advances have
work. in knowledge of the gas bacil-
lus which causes a form of g%angrene,
in the serum treatment for proven
ton or cure Of such diseases as ty-
phoid fever. lockjaw, pneumonia,
meningitis, etc. These lessons will
save far more lives in the long run
than the war has cost" >,
Nor is Major Stewart the only man
of repute to hold such views. Jo-
sephus Daniels secretary. of the
navy also believes that innumerable
blessings will arise from the lessons
that have been taught by stern ne
cessity in time Of storm and stress.
zone Of the compensations for the
tragedy of the war;" he said recently,
sis the fact that an enlightened opin-
ion is behind the organized campaign
to protect the youth against con-
tagious disease.
1.-THE campaign begun in war'to in
sure the military fitness Of men for
fighting is quite as necessary to ave
men for civil efficiency"
Sir Almroth Wright, in The London
Lancet, the most famous medical
journal in the world, says that 1.-THE
Carrel-Dakin method (of treating in
portant contribution to , surgical
technique since the beginning of the
war"
But this is only one of countless
other epoch-making methods that
have arisen triumphant over the blood
and brutality of the boche. There is
the famous ambrine treatment for
burns that was so successfully ad-
ministered in the Ambrine. hospital
for the French wounded at Compile
egne by Miss Elsie de Wolfe and
other nurses-a treatment hat proved
a godsend. for agonized poilus suffer-
ing from fiammenwerfer wounds.
Nor should n forget the marvellous
anaesthetic discovered by Gordon
Edwards. a young American humani-
tartan, which could be sprayed upon
gaping raw wounds and burns, reliev-
ing the exquisite agony OF the patient
and enabling physicians to apply and
remove bandages without the wound
ed man feeling the slightest pain.
Before this war the doctors didn't
know much about, the habits and
habitats Of that pest, the louise, which
has probably been with us since the
first crack Of dawn. But the war gave
this creature another name, and Il
wasn't long before all the world was
talking of the "ccotie." which became
the familiar Of the soldier in the
trench and helped make wal even
more like Sherman said It wa. The
~ sr834s assS JG34%Ss TfeEFN AsNfaI4E