SAVED BY A MIRACLE

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 97, 19 January 1926, Page 3

SAVED BY A MIRACLE

What, I wonder (writes “A Surgeon,” in the “Daily Mail”), would the surgeons of a century ago have thought of one of the most astounding operations of modern times recently performed at the London Hospital ? There a surgeon actually cut open and dilated one of the valves of the interior of the human heart while that heart was still carrying on its normal (unction.

Since the very bigth of medical science, the dream of performing this operation has stirred the imagination of the surgeon. But never has surgical technique been the equal of surgical imagination. This is the history of this amazing operation:— In 1921, the patient, a young girl, came up to the London Hospital suffering from mitral stenosis, or a gradual closure of one of the four valves of the heart. In spite of continuous treatment the patient did not improve, and it was decided to operate. A large flap of skin and muscle over the girl’s heart was laid back and the ribs over the cardiac area were re moved. The pericardium, or sac containing the heart, was then exposed to view, and the heart could be seen pulsating at the rate of 128 beats to the minute.

The sac was then opened, .an incision was made in the auricle (one of the four chambers of the heart) and the gloved finger of the surgeon was. inserted as a plug to stop the immediate fountain of blood. After examination it was decided not to incise the valve as had originally been intended, but merely to dilate it with the finger. The surgeon very slowly and with infinite care did this without any m shap; the incision was sutured, the pericardium closed, the ribs, the muscles, and the skin replaced layer by layer. While he was doing this the heart maintained a very nearly normal pulsation, which became wholly noimal when the chest was closed. ’1 he patient made a speedy and uninterrupted recovery, and when I last heard of her stated that she felt nerfectly well.

This is the first time this -peratiou has ever been performed on the human heart. Each month, each week almost, sees some new advance in medical knowledge. But it is doubtful whether more than a very few of the people who hurry along under the greywalls _of London's hospitals realise anything of the great pioneer work that is being carried on unceasingly within them.—-“Dr-ilr 'Mail.”