Vol. 60, 1909 - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

156 THE CHARLOXra MEDICAL JOURNAI, '
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portance to it. Many attempts have been taken her place as a power in Europe. Sir
made to find a suitable substitute for greasy Isaac Newton, Christopher Wrenn, George
or oleaginous applications in the treatment Fox and John Locke, were prominent men.
of skin diseases. For instance we ha'-e Swift, Pope, Dryden, Congrove, Prior and
Dr. Unna's plaster mulls, in which plaster Steele belonged to this period. The habeas
mass is incorporated with the mulls. I corpus act and bank of England were each
have not used the above however. In treat- about forty years old. Cromwell had been
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ing eczema we should not be content by sim- dead nearly forty years.
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ply telling our patient to daub or smear the In 1700 The Art and Science of Surgery
medicine on any "old way", but should in- included very little more than the Doctrine
struct him iu the way he should use it. Our andTreatment of Wounds, Fractures, Luxa-
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Ungts should not be smeared on the skin, tions, Tumors and Ulcers, with a descrip-
but nicely and evenly spread on linen or tion of Operations, Inslruments aud Band- I
or muslin, and bound down with a snug aging. This division was common for j
bandage, or with a ring of elastic webbing, many years later than the da'e under con- '
In all chronic patches it is well to rub in sideration. About this time the practice of
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our tar and other ointments. lithotomy was taken over by the surgeons
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Suffice it to say in concluding under the leadership of Douglass and our remarksonthetreatment
of eczema that there Cheselden. For a period of 2,000 years
is no one drug, or combination of drugs this operation had been considered to be
embodying all that is desirable in the treat- "so difficult and dangerous that it had been
metit, or ultimate result, but each case, is a ordained to be the entire profession of one
case unto itself, and is to be considered so, man free from other studies and practices."
and treated accordingly, to obtain the best The field of surgery was limited almost
and most brilliant results.
Prognosis.—Paradoxical as it
entirely to morbid conditions affecting the
may seem extremities and surface of the body. New
some cases are never cured. So we cannot growth involving the viscera belonged abalways
give absolute assurance of curing
eczema. We sometimes are forced to accept
solutely to the domain of internal medicine.
The great field of inflammatory conditions
the fact that some individuals are "3czema- affecting the viscera was undreamed of.
tons", and to cure them, regeneration is
necessary. Of course it is our duty to cure
our cases as fast as possible, and not take
refuge behind the incompetent man, and
The literature was in a most deplorable
condition. No book existed which covered
the entire field. The best books on the different
subjects had been written by men
tell our patients that we are endangering widely separated and in different languages, 1
their lives by curing their eczema. making it very difficult to acquire a working
knowledge of the best, and forcing the j
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Surgery and Surgical Literature of the ambitious to travel far to learn all that was
Eiglileentb Century.* to be known.
By T. E.W. Brown, M.D., Ashevine,N.C., Chair- As a result of this condition whenever a i
man of Section of Surgery and Anatomy.
surgeon became proficient in any one line
Mr. President, Guests and Members fo the
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it was customary for him to travel from i
Society: to town, from one country to another. In
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On occasions like the present it is the cus- ^^'^ ^^^ quacks and pretenders developed tom to discuss new theories and methods,
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^nd flourished, and to them were largely and to lay plans for the future; for this
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left those disorders and operations requiring reason we are apt to forget those who have
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^^^ greatest skill. Germany is said to have i
preceded us, and have laid the foundation swarmed with them. Today the author of
for modern surgerv. a» article hastens to give the latest refer-
Before we give our attention to the papers «nceto his subject, and seldom does he
dealing with modern surgical problems I
''«^^'' ^^ ^"y article published more than ten j
desire briefly to call your attention to the years back, but in 1700 the authorities most (
surgery and s-^rgical literature of
frequently
1700, so
quoted were Hippocrates, Celsus
that when we reflect on the great difference ^"'^ Galen, and any measure or method not
between now and then we will not
sanctioned by them was unorthodox
fail to
give due credit and honor to the men who ^o far as I can gather, the first attempt
have made this growth possible.
to cover the entire field of surgery and make <
In 1700 William III was Kino- "^ of
available for the student was undertaken i
En