DEAN & THE DOCTORS.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1875, 8 October 1913, Page 7

DEAN & THE DOCTORS.

SURGICAL METHODS. , MORE REMARKS FROM PULPIT. (By Telegraph.—Epocial Correspondent-.) Auckland, October 7. Tho question of surgical operations was further dealt with by Dean Darby at tho Church of tho Rosary, Hamilton, last Sunday. In tho course of his remarks the Dean said that ho had a duty to tho people, to sound a word of warning in tho matter. While acknowledging tlio wonders wrought in modern surgery ho held that the uumber of surgeons who wore admittedly of a high level was small. To form the conclusion that every surgeon who thrust a luiife into a living body could perform all the wonders of modern surgery was nothing less than an hallucination. Tho bulk of tlio surgeons wero moderately skilful, and most of them practised mostly as physicians and occasionally as surgeons. The result was that they wero not profound in either branch. A. considerable number of surgeons wero surgeons only occasionally by way of exception, and they used tho knife in, search of information. "I'horo aro very few surgeons," he continued, "with first-class skill and first-class ' knowledge, many with moderate skill and moderate knowledge, and , somo with very little of either. Tlio poor have to put up with tho last two classes and take their chances. No doubt every surgeon will do his best, but his very best is sometimes vastly difforont from tlio very best that, sumioal art can do in tho hands of its ablest and most skilful exponents. To my mind there is as much difforonco between tho surgeon who performs tho highest flights of ,sur-. gory about which we read, and, the ordinary workaday surgeons as thero is between tho winner of tho Melbourne Cup and tho ordinary .hutchor's horse. These thoughts, I trust ; will tend to show that there aro solid grounds for tho cry which I have raised against the operation fad. It must also bo homo in mind that the operator, skilled orunskilled, is insured against ; the trouble of the law. Certainly theso thoughts make me an advocate of the simple life and simple remedies, and of the necessity of looking before you leap on to tho operating table."