A REMARKABLE OPERATION.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 2169, 13 August 1897, Page 3

A REMARKABLE OPERATION.

With a little machine which looks like an beater, Dr Fenton B. Turck recently in Chicago performed the feat of laundering the inside of a man's stomach at the post medical school, an<l L>.> means of the Roentgenray he ai th ■ s-.i, ■•• time viewed the internal apartment v"v-i - his little device was at a oik. The .;,-nuion marks an era of progress in the n.edica' world as the experimen; was the first ' •.••kind ' made in full view of the <>\« One of the largest and most com;.: ■ R*m:ntgen ray outfits ever prodie ■ 1 was furnished to the college for th- * ej 'uent. Attached to the end of Dr rurck'S instrument, which is called a gyrumele or r-evolving sound, was a flexible cable of - spiral steel wire, on the end of which --1 was a "small sponge. The cable was enclosed in a rubber tube, and this with the sponge was swallowed by the patient. The latter, who was stripped to the waist, then stepped before the Roentgen light, the doctor put the ftuoriscope to his eyes anc\ an attendant turned the handle of the gyromele. The cable revolved as fast or as slow as was desired; the sponge at the farther end proceeded to its work of scouring the inner walls of the patient's stomach, while the doctor through the fluoriscope viewed the work by locating the metallic cable by means of the X-rays. By pushing or pulling on the cable the various portions of the inner walls of the stomach were operated on, and the matter which was gathered on the sponge was then removed for microscopic examination. No nausea or other discomfort was felt by the patient, though he stood before- the rays for over an hour ■while the doctors in attendance, the nurses, the operator of the X-ray outfit, and a newspaper man examined his interior. At the close of the ordeal he was offended that no one of the party would gratify his curiosity to see the operation by temporarily taking his place as patient and swallowing the sponge and tube, despite his assertions that it had not hurt him. The ray outfit )*« used in the operation is capable of throwing a fourteen inch spark of great density and illuminating a very large Crookes tube. By its means it was not only possible to see the ribs and backbone of the patient, but to view the vibrations of the heart and to outline the liver and kidneys.—American paper. ,