DEATH UNDER CHLOROFORM.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14132, 6 August 1909, Page 4

DEATH UNDER CHLOROFORM.

A HOSPITAL OPERATION, -■■•'• . ;'-.,';;-;';..■':'_-; .'• : --- ,; : :^'S--:; ;S|i^ VERDICT OF MISADVENTURE. An inquest was held at the hospital yes. terday afternoon on the body of law Ann Blackburn, a woman of 35 years of age, who died on-the operating table on Wednesday morning while being operated on for goitre. Deceased was the wife of *~" Richard Blackburn, of Onehunga. The Coroner (Mr. T. Gresham) presided, an i Sergeant Carroll represented the police. Dr.. Jas. Gloss, senior resident medical officer, said deceased was admitted to the ' | hospital on the 27th ult, suffering from : - goitre.- She had been suffering for about I five years. The operation took place on I Wednesday, all the resident staff being present. Chloroform was administered in ' J the usual manner. The superior thyroid artery was tied, and the operation thus completed. : No blame attached to the anaesthetist. Dr. Stanley A, Bull said he had mad© a post-mortem examination of the body of deceased.- The body was considerably emaciated. .There was a surgical wound on the right side of the neck, about 3in :long, and a. second over the region of the heart. 'The first incision was that of the operation, the second was one necessary in the \ endeavour to / restore animation. Neither would'have anything to do with v . the cause of death. The condition of the heart showed that failure had been sudden.: The heart valves and muscles were both . healthy,-there being no organic disease.

It was the heart of a person to whom there/: would be no indications of special danger in giving chloroform. The cause of death - ~ was syncope, caused principally by the disease from which deceased was suffering, and possibly in part by the chloroform/. The operation proposed was a common

one, and was the mildest form of operative treatment applied to that disease. ' The operation was skilfully performed,. and had nothing directly to do with .the."' . cause'-: of .death. The particular form, of goitre from which deceased 'was suffering was not infrequently terminated hy mdien death, even without operation or adninistration of chloroform. 'The jury returned a verdict that death, resulted from misadventure.