Changes in surgical treatment of chronic duodenal ulcers during past fifty years.

Abstract

I have been asked to put on record my personal observations on the changes in the surgical treatment of chronic duodenal ulcers during the past 50 years. I respond to this request with alacrity, for my contacts with this subject date back to the beginning of this century. I shall confine my remarks to personal observations made on the ward services at the University Surgical Clinic in Heidelberg under Professor Czerny (1904-1906) and on the ward service at Mount Sinai Hospital (1907-1937). I left the ward service at Mount Sinai Hospital when I reached the age limit of 62, in 1937. During my internship in Heidelberg the Murphy button was used exclusively for the performance of a gastroenterostomy, the only operation then in use for the surgical treatment of chronic duodenal ulcer. An intestinal anastomosis by suture of stomach and small intestine was not perfected suffi In the early 1930's