Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-02-15
French Lay Heavy Fine on
German City in ReprisaI
SURGEON At GRADY
SEWS UP WOUND
IN YOUTHS HEART

Glenn Freeman, a young negro
boy, is at Grady hospital on the road
to recovery, after one of the most
remarkable operations in the history
of local surgery, performed Monday
night.
His heart was lifted out of it's nor.
NAL position, vicious knife wound
sewed up and the heart replaced in
its normal position, functioning
properly, with the life-sapping flow
Of blood stopped.
Freeman owes his life to the skill.
ed fingers of DR.. w. r. Smith. resi-
dent surgeon at Grady, who per-
formed the operation in one hour
and twenty minutes, frequently hav.
ing to stop to replace the boys heart
in its normal position to keep it
beating properly.
Tuesday morning, DIR. Smith pro-
nounced the negro in excellent con
dition and stated he would suffer
few i'll effects from his dangerously
close skirmish with death.
Five Stitches in Heart
Making a triangular incision over
his fifth rib, DR.. Smith removed
three inches of the rib, made an
inch and half incision in. the peri
cardium, the fibrous sac that sur
rounds the heart, pushed the heart
up through the incision in the peri
cardium, sewed up the wound in
the right ventricle and then replaced
the heart in it's normal position.
Five stitches were taken in the
heart proper. After each stitch was
made, the heart had to be replaced
in it's sac so that it might resume
it's normal movement.
Describing the movement of the
heart, DR.. Smith said that, normally
it moves regularly, like one would
open and close his hand, slowly and
Systematically. When pushed up
DR.. Smith said, the heart began tc
f1utter, much in the maner a lea1
does in a brisk wind, and as eacI
stitch was taken, the heart was
pushed back and the operation
halted until it had resumed its nor
NAL swing.
The operation was commenced
with the use of local anesthesia, but
as it progressed, the negro became
restless and began to struggle
Ether then had to be used to keer
him quiet.
Tuesday morning the negro talked
freely and declared he felt no pain
He was immensely pleased when
the doctor told him he would re
cover. The negro does not know
that the blade of the knife pene
trated and tore deep cash into his
heart, but is under the impression
that it came mighty close" to this
vital organ.
Operation Remarkable
The operation performed by DR..
Smith is one Of the rarest and most
difficult in the annals of surgery.
Never before has successful suture
of the heart been accomplished in
Atlanta, and local physicians declare
statistics show few elsewhere in tEe
world have been completed where
the patient recovered. .E
The first time in history heart
operation was attempted was in
1896, when an Italian surgeon in
Rome successfully opened a mans
heart and sewed it up. Until that
time heart operations had been con-
sidered necessarily fatal, and none
ever attempted.
DR.. Smith has been in Atlanta but
eighteen months, coming here from
New York city. He graduared in
surgery from Cornell university, and
since has devoted his attention 10
hospital surgery.
A number of Atlanta surgeons Ge-
clared DR.. Smiths operation was: one
of the most wonderful ever brought
to their attention.