SCISSORS FOR AN OPERATION

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 33, 2 November 1929, Page 31

SCISSORS FOR AN OPERATION

DOCTOR’S DEATH GAMBLE News of how a doctor, equipped with only a pair of old scissors, carride out an operation that saved a boy’s life, comes from one of the smaller Hebridean Islands. The summons came late at night, and after a stormy passage of six miles in a small yacht, and a long journey over a rough hill road, the doctor arrived at the island. The patient was already in a state of coma, and sinking. Diagnosing uraemia., a condition of blood poisoning arising from kidney trouble, the doctor succeeded, by' means of profuse perspiration, in reducing the frequency of tho recurring seizures from every quarter to every half hour. But he quickly realised that more drastic measures were needed it the boy was to survive. With a Gaelicspeaking district nurse,as interpreter, he informed the parents that the only hope lay in the old-fashioned bloodletting method. "Tell them,” he said, "that the chance is only about one in a hundred, and it may even hasten death.” To bis surprise they agreed. Having no surgical implements with him, the doctor called for a razor. The house had neither razor nor pocket knife; but a pair of rusty scissors used for cleaning fish and rabbits was found. There was no disinfectant, not even whisky, but a small quantity of gin was found; and after treating the scissors in spring water, and then in gin, the doctor cut into the boy’s forearm, and after letting enough blood from one of the larger reins, he strapped the arm back to the shoulder to arrest the bleeding. Later on the same day word came to the doctor by telephone that the boy had recovered consciousness, and today, rather more than a fortnight after, he took his first walk'as a convalescent. ■