On the Evolution of Wound-treatment during the Last Forty Years

Abstract

THE appearance of this book at the present time is opportune, for the lectures deal very largely with Lord Lister's researches on antiseptic treatment, of which they form a brief history. Lister's treatment was on Pasteur's demonstrations and writings, and no man ever acknowledged an indebtedness more often and more unequivocally. At the commencement of the first lecture the procedure adopted in 1860, or thereabouts by Mr. Syme, the period immediately preceding the introduction of antiseptics, is detailed. In 1868 or so Lister's first method of treating wounds antiseptically was being tested by its author. This consisted in swabbing the wound with undiluted carbolic acid (a crude and impure preparation at that time) and covering it with lint saturated with the same substance, over which a piece of sheet-lead was placed; each day the lead was removed and the lint painted over with the carbolic. By such treatment, crude and simple as it may now appear, it was abundantly demonstrated that wounds, even the dreaded compound fracture, would heal without suppuration. Subsequently, a putty consisting of whiting and carbolic acid was used, and step by step carbolic gauze, corrosive sublimate, mercuric iodide, and the cyanide gauzes were evolved. The author holds that no mere dressing with dry sterilised wool or gauze, apart from germicidal solutions, will suffice to prevent suppuration in dirty wounds, and with this pronouncement many will conrdially agree.