OPERATION FOR ULCER

Press, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 26639, 26 January 1952, Page 9

OPERATION FOR ULCER

TANKER’S ENGINEER NOW RECOVERING TRANSFER AT SEA TO FREIGHTER (New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, January 25. The freighter Duquesa was three days out from Panama, bound for Wellington, when it received a radio call for medical help from the Norwegian tanker Bernhard Hanssen, whose engineer (Mr George Alan Collier) aged 40, of Yorkshire, was critically ill. The tanker carried no doctor, but the Duquesa, besides its ship’s doctor, had among the 12 passengers, a Harley street surgeon ana a former trained nurse. Throughout one night, the doctor on the Duquesa (Dr. F. J. Cutler) sat by the radio operator, sending instructions for the treatment of the patient. Then the last message from the tanker came: “Mr Collier is very weak Can you take him aboard?’’ pie ships were in sight of each other, ana the sea was calm. The patient was transferred to the Duquesa, and an operation for a perforated formed 81 UlCer W “ s succes “ ully per ' ‘ When the Duquesa arrived at Wellington yesterday, Mr Collier was taken by ambulance to the Wellington Hospital, where his condition today was reported as satisfactory. The surgeon on the Duquesa was Dr. W. Netley Searle, formerly of Oamaru, and now of Harley street, London. The anaesthetist was Dr. Cutler, of Hastings, Sussex. The nurse was Mrs Mary Usher, formerly of the Auckland Hospital, and the assistant nurse was Mr J. Pendelburg, the chief steward of the Duquesa.