AMBROISE PARE

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 July 1931, Page 11

AMBROISE PARE

FATHER OF MODERN SURGERY.

“I operated upon them, and God cured them/’ was Amtyroise Pare’s unvarying reply, even A after he had successfully performed operations that astuonded the men of his day.

Although he was born in the reign of Francis L, at which time a law had been passed making registration of births compulsory, there is no record of Pare’s (writes Francis Dickie in the “Sydney Morning Herald”). In addition to this, in the various old manuscripts and printed books of his time, written by Pare, and others dealing with his life and work, there are puzzling conflictions of dates. Thus we find his birth set variously from 1509 to 1517. Even Pare contradicts himself in some of his works written in his latter years, so as to give a difference of six years in his age. However, from a comparison of various events, in view of the elements of uncertainty, it was decided by the Faculty of the Sorbonne to set this present year as marking the 400th anniversary of his entering the profession.

As a badly-educated boy he came from the town of Laval, in the district of the Loire, to Paris, and entered the shop of a barber-surgeon. In those days, it must be particularly recalled the barbers and the surgeons learned their professions in the same shop. Though they did much to aid suffering humanity, they were looked down upon by the medical practitioners, proud of their mastery of long prescriptions. The life of an apprenticesurgeon was a hard one. It is amazing that any ever graduated. Pare went to work at five o’clock in the morning. After sweeping the shop, he attended to the hair cutting or other requirements of the early going workers who desired to be fixed up before starting their day. This work meant much to Pare and other apprentices, for they received a few tips. About nine o’clock Pare set off making the rounds of a certain district allotted to him. He called on each house, and where required combed wigs, cut hair, or rendered other services. It is related that in a single morning he knocked upon as many as 50 doors soliciting work. Returning to the shop about 2 o’clock, he assisted the barber-surgeon at minor operations. If there were none to be done, he attended the customers, or worked at making instruments until 7 o’clock in the evening. The only free time he had to study anatomy and kindred subjects was in the evening. At this time, the barber-surgeons were supposed to give their apprentices one afternoon a week free to attend lectures of members of the Faculty of Medicine. However, the barber-surgeons made much profit off the labour of their apprentices, and kept them at work upon this day. So flagrantly were the lectures neglected by the apprentices, due to their masters’ greed, that the Faculty, out of a sense of duty, offered to give groups of apprentices lessons from 4 to 5 o’clock in the morning, a good time before they started work.

A PLACE OF TORMENT. Ambroise Pare, graced with a strong constitution and an eager mind, succeeded after four years in graduating from his shop to the “Hotel Dieu.” This hospital, the oldest in the world, founded in 660, and still an important institution to-day, was a dreadful place in the days when Pare laboured there. All manner of sick people came not only from the city, but the surrounding country. It was staffed by a group of men and women who had taken a vow to devote their lives to the suffering. But the volunteers were not numerous. Some 25 men and an equal number of women were called upon to the work, that really required four times that number.

Patients were placed three to a bed, regardless of whether they suffered from contagious disease. In times of great demand upon the hospital’s space, a fourth patient was even laid across the foot. But, outside of such meagre details, we learn nothing from Pare or other writers about the medico-surgery service in particular at the Hotel Dieu.

Immediately on graduating, Pare joined the army of King Henry 11. as an assistant surgeon. And for the next twenty-five years his scientific work was constantly interrupted by various expeditions with different armies.

The first time he went to war was just after the first use of firearms. His superior surgeons were faced with a new problem, as gunshot wounds differed from any kind of previous wound they had treated. From examinations of the writings of the time we cull such remarks of various leading army surgeons regarding guns: “The wounds they made are venomous; we must kill the venom. The wounds they made are poison; we must kill the poison.” They certainly adopted the most drastic measures. Gunshot wounds were treated with boiling oil. At the siege of Metz, Pare found himsejlf with many wounded on his hands, and not sufficient boiling oil to treat them all. He was a very conscientious man, and his inability to give them what he considered a necessary treatment, worried him so he could hardly sleep. However, he gave great attention to the dressing of the wounds. On the third night lie noted, to his surprise, that those wounds which had not been treated -with boiling oil were beginning to heal. At the same time the wounded men who had been treated with boiling oil were still writhing in agony, and the wounds showing no signs of improving. From that time on, Pare left off the barbarous methods of his superiors.

Shortly after, in his search for better remedies, he met a man in Turin who had a cure called “Puppy-dog Oil.” After much cultivating of this man, Pare got the formula, but only on the promise that it be kept secret and sold for profit, in which the man was to share. Pare, however, was a true scientist. He believed tfiat any great boon to humanity should be revealed to all. He writes of this incident: “I have promised with my word, but not with my will.” It was not a very ethical action, but, considering the greatest good to the greatest number, he salved his conscience for- breaking his word. The “Puppy Dog Oil,” sad to relate, did not stand the test of use. It was only after long experimenting that Pare invented something himself. It was at the battle of Damvilliers that Pares proved himself a great surgeon. The Duke de Rohan was terribly wounded in the leg by a cannonball. He was so weak from shock and loss of blood that the other surgeons deemed the case hopeless. Amputation

of the limb was necessary; but it did not seem possible that he could stand the agony of cauterising with the redhot iron usual at the time. It was in this emergency that there dawned upon Pare the idea of tying the severed arteries with a double cord. He took it upon himself to operate, and the patient, saved the shock of cauterisation, recovered. A NEW ERA OPENED.

This discovery marked a new era in surgery. The previous tortures of the red-hot iron treatment had caused countless deaths by shock. This heavy mortality rate was now decreased. It is particularly worthy of note that Pare’s methods of tying the arteries in the 16th century remained little improved upon actually until the time of Lister in our own day. , At the siege of Boulogne the Duke de Guise was terribly wounded in the face near the eye by a spear, a piece of which remained fixed. The Duke’s personal surgeons gave the matter up as hopeless. Pare, however, after begging permission of the Duke for so great a liberty, put his foot on one side of his face in order to get leverage for his tongs, and brought the piece of steel away. His subsequent treatment of the wound was such that the Duke fully recovered. The Duke did not forget Pare. In Paris, Pare’s fame was constantly growing. He had been made surgeon to King Henry, on his return from the first carfipaign. In spite of this and the good work he did, he was opposed for many years by the Faculty of Medicine, which tried to prevent the publication of his various treatises. His origin as a barber who knew nothing of Latin was argued against his writings having any value. But Pare kept right on getting results. One of his experiments was the breaking of the joint of a crippled elblow and resetting it, so that the arm assumed normal shape. He conducted a barber-surgeon’s shop in the rue St. Andre des Arts, near the Place St. Michel. He was also welcomed by the college of St. Cosme, a more liberal institution than the Faculty of Medicine. To combat this college, the Faculty, which was exceedingly powerful, had a law passed forbidding them to have bodies for dissection without special permission. But Pare was not to be stopped from carrying on his researches. He got cadavers in some way, and for 25 years carried on work in secret in his home. He also collected some 300 works on the subject of barber-surgery to that time. These were unfortunately dispersed. But a large number of his treatises have been collected into three volumes in the Bibliotheque Nationale. By the time he had reached the age of 45, he was so important a figure that the College of St. Cosme deemed it only right that he should be given the Master’s Bonnet. However, there we a ruling that no man could hold such who did not know Latin. In order to get around this, the address that Pare must deliver was written out for him a considerable time in advance so that he could learn it by heart. On December 18, 1554, he received his master’s degree. Though a friend of the poor, Pare had also a large following of rich people, due to his standing at Court, and when he died in 1590, he was a rich man.

Strange to relate, progress in surgery stopped at his death. Not until the time of Louis XIV., half a century later, did things improve. And Pare’s discoveries, particularly the tying of the arteries; stand out so clearly in importance that to-day he is honoured as the “father of modern surgery”