OPERATION AT SEA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19719, 19 August 1927, Page 10

OPERATION AT SEA.

IN DENTITY OF SURGEON. LATE OF AUCKLAND HOSPITAL. The "medical student" who performed the amazing operation for appendicitis on a seaman of the steamer Port Auckland is believed to be Dr. 0. S. Hetherington. If so then it is wrong to refer to him as a student, as he has been a qualified doctor for three years, having graduated from the medical school of Otago University .three or four years ago. Dr. Hetherington was one of the resident medical officers at the Auckland Hospital for a year thereafter, and has also acted as locum tenens for practitioners in the Auckland Province. He sailed on the Port Auckland as the ship's doctor.

The operation was reported from London to have been performed on the ship's dining table, the incision being made with a pair of toilet scissors and the patient's tongue kept in position with a safety pin. Why such improvisation should have been necessary he could not explain, said Mr. C. W. Heather, of Heather, Roberton, Ltd., Auckland agents for the C. and D. line, of which the Port Auckland is a unit. The scissors might have been used to sever the appendix, but could hardly have made the incision. In any case all the C. and D. liners carried a serviceable surgical kit and a qualified medical officer.