SURGICAL OPERATION DURING AIR RAID

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2606, 30 October 1915, Page 14

SURGICAL OPERATION DURING AIR RAID

During one of tlhe Zeppelin raids on tho east coast of England, a surgeon of one of the places visited was performing the operation of tracheotomy at a nursing home. When the German aircraft came over the town the electric current, was at once cut off. All the lights went out suddenly, and this, too, at the very moment when tho surgeon in question was opening tho wind-pipe. Fortunatol.y» it was not the first attack delivered against this place, a fishing and soa-bathing resort. Taught by experience, the operator had made it a matter of habit to warn his nurses nnd other assistants that lamps should be kept ready for use during all operations which had be undertaken at night. This precaution may have Baved the small patient's life. With but a trifling delay tho tracheotomy was completed, and tho child is now doing well. To liave performed so dclicat-e an operation in such, circumstances, lemarks tho "Lancet," is a considerable feat, for the raid was a serious one, a good many bombs were dropped, several people wore killed and injured, and the feeling at tho moment was naturally one of intense apprehension. Some of the bombs hit a house in tho neighbourhood, the residence of ailother well-known practitioner. Luckily no one was at homo at tho time, a.ud the medical practitioner got off with tlie destruction of a certain amount of property. Tho experience recorded will no doubt ensure the taking by medical men generally of the precautions wihicli in this case had been fortunately observed.