The Gisborne Times PUBLISHED EVENT MORNIKG GISBORNE, AUGUST 28, 1906.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIII, Issue 1845, 28 August 1906, Page 2

The Gisborne Times PUBLISHED EVENT MORNIKG GISBORNE, AUGUST 28, 1906.

Anyo.vu who is not familiar with the ordinary requirements of up-to-date surgery ou reading tho annual reoort of ti e Inspector of Hospitals, Dr McGregor, might ho drawn to tho conclusion that ho is ovor fastidious, or perhaps that his strictures imply the necessity for employing bald headed nurses only who would riot indulge in tho luxury of a wig or adorn themselves with much wearing apparel and who would discard jewellory altogether. If that were so it would be a didicult matter to find nurses, for it is apparently not an easy matter to prevent those who oujoy the possession of a profusion of silky flowing locks from adding a further artificial supply. Tho Inspector’3 remarks, however, are not directed against the ordinary fashion on aesthetic grounds, but because he recognises, as ali surgeons do, tho absolute danger that lurks in the fashion when it is permitted to enter the operating room, and in that sense his condemnation of it is fully justified. Not a great many years ago it was not deemed necessary to take any precautions before operations were performed; but as biology became more clearly understood and microscopy shed its light upon the existence of myriads of infin'tes'mal organisms whoso work was to produce suppuration and disease wherover they could find tho proper conditions for their growth and multiplication, surgeons found it necessary to rid the operating room of these organisms before performing operation?, aud as a consequence the antiseptic method was generally adopted. This after fair trial was found to be not wholly ro- I liable, and many cases of suppuration | and even dangerous inoculation re

suited though the strictest precautions had been observed. These results led

to further experiments to find out where tlio infection came from, and it,

us soon discovered that tho hair a

clotles of tho operator or his assistants supplied tho inodiiim tiy which these dangerous organisms worn convoyed from outside tho storilizod oporating room to tlio nowly opened wound witliiu it. It was known that from tho dust of tho streets or of u room disseminated in tho air by a hroe/.o or tho sweeper's broom sent those invisible speci yo-. virulent entities floating about, and what was moro natural than that a profuso miiHs of hair or woollen clothing should entrap and ro.ain tiiom until they woro shaken froo, perhaps to full upon a gapiug wound under treatmont hy tho possessor of tho cranial adornment. A study of theso things soon lod to tho adoption of what is known as aseptic surgery, which has everywhere taken tho place of tho ; otisoptio rnothod. For fifteen or t* onfy years this latter method has L on practised with signal succoss in ovo. y caso wlioro tho opor-

ator and his assistants observed tlio strict conditions. Theso conditions demand tho absoluto exclusion of tho

organism from tho oporating room, and honco tlio room is so constructed as to admit of a froo current of air through sterilizing pipos, and the covoring of tho operator’s hair and body with asoptic covoring during tho oporation so that tho danger of shaking down upon tho wound a shower of poisonous gorms like popper from a box by tho movement of tlio body or tho dangling of a noeklaeo is absolutely provonted by tho surgeon who is carotid in his work. Public safety demands tlio strictest observance of these conditions, for without it there is always tho possibility that a nurse or an assistant may have entrapped a few specimens of—let us say—the tetanus bacillus, and if they happened to fall

into the wound from the nurse’s hair or eyo-lashes the surgeon would have a very anxious time in tho course of an hour or or two, if indeed he did not lose his patient altogether But in this matter, as in many others, “ familiarity breeds contempt,” and in this mattor particularly, because in the average feminine mind there exists as s rong a desire for up-to-date fashion as for up to-date surgery and the former is prone to becomo the dominant one, hence the reason for stroDg insistence upon every precau tion being observed, and Dr McGregor must be commended for so doing. Every surgeon of course aims at as psis in his work, but it must not be forgotten that the hospital nurse has also an important part to play even after the operation has boon successfully performed, for it is often her duty to dress the wound when it is exposed for that purpose, and it is thou very often that mischief is done, because less care is taken to prevont tlio dusting of the wound from the ornamentations of the nurse. We havo heard of a case of inoculation caused by powder falling on an incission from the face of a nurse, who used it liberally in her toilot and who had no idea of its danger to the patient. But enough has been said to to emphasise Dr McGregor’s attitude on this important matter and to make plain the necessity for a standard unbreakable regulation governing the actions and uniform of all hospital nurse 3 while engaged in surgical cases. Fashion must not be permitted to enter the hospitals of the colony, or as sure as fato the bacillus will accompany it. It ought to be said however, that enquiry on our part, unsuspected as to its purpose, lias suppliei tho gratifyiog information that tl foregoing remarks cannot apply te our local institution, with which the Inspector ha?, as usual, no fault to find,