TWO BRAVE BOYS

Hokitika Guardian, 27 May 1929, Page 8

TWO BRAVE BOYS

LIVES SAVED 13Y “SPARE PARTS.” MARVELS OE SURGERY. SYDNEY, May 16. Two boy marvels of surgery, Tommy Mclntosh, 12, and Frank Capper, 7, are receiving considerable publicity in .Melbourne, and surgeons state that neither would be alive to-day unless lie was what they term a “good doer,” Adults similarly placed, the surgeons are certain, would not have won through. It was growing, insistent life that triumphed. Tommy was crushed in a motor accident and suffered a comminuted •fracture of the pelvis. There were most serious complications of internal; organs. Tubes were inserted to do the work of those crushed organs, while the surgeons got to work to allow Nature, assisted by Tommy’s bright spark of hope, to concentrate on the work of biological reconstruction. He bore great pain manfully. Fully a year passed' before Tommy got out of bed and sat in a chair. One day he was allowed to stand on his feet. It was the queerest feeling lie ever had. The blood rushing down those limbs, long unused, made a feeling like thousands of pins and needles being stuck red hot into Ins feet and legs. Soon he was able to walk, and now lie runs messages for the other patients taking steps two at a- time. One ol the tube* is still ill bis stomach and will have to be taken away later. Tommy has been told that lie will never be able to do bard work, but in view of the nature of bis injuries it is remarkable that lie should live to do any work at all. At the present time he is the “oldest inhabitant” at the children’s hospital where be has been for seventeen months. He is to go home within a week. Frank Capper was nearly six when lie swallowed a piece of caustic soda Enr more than a year he did not swallow anything except exploring instruments which the surgeons pushed down into his stomach. The causticsoda had burned away the lining of an incli and a quarter of the oesophagus and the scar which formed blocked it completely.. Tf it bad not been for surgery lie would have died sloivy ol starvation. The (esophagus is the main Co,id channel leading ino the Stomach Tlie doctors punctured a'hole in his stomach and put a tube in it through which lie was fed for many months. It was not a. limiter of having meals at (Mid intervals with Frank. The raw occasion was when lie got a. rest from being fed through bis tube. Be bad lost so much weight that the first need was that lie should begin to build strength and put on weight. It was not pleasant being always fed on milk and beaten egg, which you never bad even tlie pleasure of tasting. Worse it was .sometimes painful to have treatment ‘from tlie , su/gcons in restoring natural food, communication. A piece of silk was pushed through tlie puncture and through the oesophagus when a way was at last made, and thence out of bis mouth. Then the end more Cired together, so that this makes a sort of endless chain through Frank’s little body. About once a week it was nulled round. At first the pain was so great that the doctors administered an amestfietic. Now be needs no balm and takes no notice of the operation. He has left the hospital after more than a year, and now )\e, eats again and eats in the ordinary way, tboug.i he still keeps the puncture apparatus as a sort of standby. At first bis nalate forgot the sense of taste, but ithas now returned. The day will soon come when Frank will shed bis spare parts and be a normal boy again.