Caesarean section and its modifications : with an additional list of five cases / by Murdoch Cameron, M.D., F.F.P.S.G., Regius Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Glasgow University.

  • Cameron, Murdoch.
Date:
[1901]
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Caesarean section and its modifications : with an additional list of five cases / by Murdoch Cameron, M.D., F.F.P.S.G., Regius Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Glasgow University. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    felt that very little hope was held out to him that his wife could be saved by section. Amongst such men we had Napoleon, who, when appealed to by Dubois, said: Treat the Empress as you would a shopkeeper’s wife in the line St. ]\Iartin, but, if one life must be lost, by all means save the mother.” In marked contrast to him we had Henry YIIL, who, when thus questioned before the birth of his son Edward, exclaimed: “ Save the child by all means, for other wives can be easily found.” At the present time such men might be put down as either a good husband but a bad father, or a good father but a bad husband. The doctrine of the Jionian Catholic Church has been that, if you could not extract the child without killing it, you could not, without mortal sin, do so, and likewise until lately, it was held that the infant could not be baptised in the uterus, as it should be oicttus before it could be rcncUus by baptism. Of late years the happy results following Caesarean section and Porro’s operation have done much to efface the dreadful feeling, that we have got in such cases to decide whether the lile of the mother or that of the child is to have our preference, seeing it is now quite possible to save both. Barnes wrote: “ Caesarean section is resorted to with a feeling akin to despair. Embryotomy stands first, and must be adopted in every case where it can be carried out without injuring the mother. Caesarean section conies last, and must be resorted to in those cases where embryotomy is either impracticable, or cannot be carried out without injuring the mother. There is, therefore, no election. The law is defined and clear. Caesarean section is the last refuge of stern necessity,” As against this statement. Dr. Barnes has recently said: “It is no longer permitted to us, without ample proof of clear necessity, to sacrifice the child in order to save the mother. Ihe cases in which the two lives are supposed to stand in antagonism are vanishing before the light of modern science and skill.” ^ If any thing is needed to sicken one at the revolting practice of craniotomy, I might be allowed to relate the obstetric history