ADVANCES IN SURGERY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIX, Issue 101, 29 March 1939, Page 8

ADVANCES IN SURGERY.

TREATMENT OF CANCER,

PROGRESS OVERSEAS. Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, .March 23. Surgeon to Her Majesty Queen Diary since the death of King George V, Sir Alfred Webb-Johnson, of the Middlesex Hospital, London, arrived at Wellington to-day. He will spend eight days in New Zealand, motoring through the North Island with Lady WebbJohnson. Sir Alfred said lie had been in Australia, where lie attended the congress in Melbourne of the Royal AustraF asian College of Surgeons. The biggest advance in surgery in recent years, said Sir Alfred, was in chest operations. This had been brought about as a result of the war, when surgeons were constantly required to deal with deep chest wounds, and considerable knowledge and experience were added to the science of surgery. To-day tumours and infections of the lungs, and tuberculosis, were much more frequently treated with complete success. The most important development in cancer was in educating the public to seek advice early and not to dread tho disease unduly. Then they could feel assured of successful treatment. The longer the disease was left to run its course, tho harder it was to catch up —indeed, often impossible. Big advances had been made in recent years in radiology and X-ray treatment, of cancer. In California, Professor E. 0. Lawrence had inveuted the machine known as the cyclotron, which produced neutron rays many times more powerful than X-ray or radium, and it was hoped, by using these in conjunction with various chemical elements, to control their action on the tumour. The incidence of cancer appeared greater at present than in the past, because of the greater average expectation of life and the greatly increased number of people who attained the “danger age”—middle age or over. Formerly a greater proportion of the population succumbed to infantile mortality, or youth ailments. Sir Alfred possesses the distinction of having been knighted by King Edward VIIT, having figured in the only Honours List of his brief reign.