Wayne State University School of Medicine - Yearbook (Detroit, MI)

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'fx tx. ,, 833 It ..I .L ' Fi 51uu The Bettmann Archive Billroth in Vienna amphitheatre. German surgeons introduced asepsis, made abdomen surgeon's playgroundfl Surgery is the oldest of the arts. Adam was our first patientg ib resection our first operation. While the success of the pro- edure is debated to this day, it established without question the ramatic ability of surgery to affect our daily lives. The earliest recorded operations are to be found in the Edwin 'mith Papyrus written in Egypt about 3000 to 2500 B.C. Sig- ificantly, 40 of the 48 surgical case histories deal with trauma nd the remainder with lesions of the breast, presumably ancer. The clarity and practical approach to the problems escribed ramain models of surgical thinking. Equally expres- ive, but modeled in bone, are the numerous skulls, 8-10,000 ears old, with clean-cut, punched-out holes which give mute vidence ofthe practice of trephination. 'These also bare testi- ony to an ancient interdisciplinary approach where surgeons nd psychiatrists apparently made common bond in their ttempts to release evil spirits. While occasional accounts of surgical triumphs are to be ound in early literature, the discipline of surgery only flourished n times of war. Without anesthesia, instruments to achieve emostasis or knowledge of the existence of microorganisms, lective operations were never contemplated. Surgery remained imited to the management of severe trauma and acute emergen- ies such as the incision of abscesses or the attempted relief of trangulatecl hernia when the patient was in extremis. Although he art was in the hands of the barbers and itinerant quacks for .ourageous entrepreneurs, depending on one's prejudicel, en- ightened surgeons with a vision of the future began to appear uring the Middle Ages. Guy de Chauliac, who died in 1368, stated that Uthe surgeon hould be lettered, not only in the principles of surgery, but also fmedicine, in theory as much as in practice. Two hundred ears later, Ambroise Pare, the great surgeon of the Renais- ance, trained in a series of military campaigns, introduced the ligature and defined surgery as nan art which teaches the way by reason, how by the operation of the hand we may cure, pre- vent, and mitigate diseases . . . The foundations of modern surgery were laid by the great Scot, john Hunter, C1728-17935 who advised his pupil Jenner to try the experiment. His restless mind, creative energies and incessant curiosity led him to apply the experimental method to research in inflammation, wound healing, transplantation, evolution, and endocrinology. His critical approach influenced all branches of medicine. The implementation of these principles, however, had to wait on the discovery of anesthesia in 1846 and the demonstration exactly 100 years ago by Lister, gentle Quaker and gentle surgeon, that sepsis was related to bacteria. The past 100 years has seen surgery pass from one triumph to another. As long as 1910, Lord Moynihan commented that Hsurgery is safe for the patient, the patient must now be made safe for surgery. Today no area of the body is inaccessible. Neurosurgeons have followed the pioneering path of Harvey Cushing and are able to maintain functioning isolated brain preparations in the experimental laboratories for many hours. Cardiac surgeons repair defects inside the heart with seeming nonchalance and predictable success. They have returned the field to the cardiologist and have gone on to plan the design of implantable artificial hearts. And so surgery, seeking new horizons, moves to higher prospects, vigorous, inventive, and undaunted by nature's obstacles. The younger generations now focus their attention on the problems of organ transplantation and have already made significant contributions to the discipline of immunology. Perhaps some enterprising surgeon may yet complete the circle and succeed in reshrinking Eve's successors and replacing them on call to where they belong-close to man's heart. 83

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DEPARTME T or CE ERAL SURGERY ' - I l l Alexancleruj. Wall, Chairman fvliev-'ir' ann.-m-A-few,-f FIRST ROW Cleft to rightlz john M. Hartzell, Zwi Steiger, Agustin Arbulu, Irwin K. Rosenberg, Alexanderj. Walt, William S. Carpen- ter, Kamil Imamoglu, Robert F. Wilson, Norman D. Nigro. SECOND ROW Cleft to rightjz Nicholas S. Gimbel, Hubert C. Huebl, Ernest M. Berkas, Elmer E.. Kobold, john R. Brown, Moufid Mitri, Paul H. Kindling, Franklin R. jackson. THIRD ROW fleft to righljz Herbert J. Robb, Thomas Grifka, Henry Vzinderlicrg, -lr., Conrad F. Bernys, Homer M. Smathers, Vishwanzith M. Szxrdesai, Clifford D. Benson.

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