Some surgical aspects of carcinoma : the presidential addres, delivered Oct. 9th, 1889, at the opening of the 16th session of the Bristol Medico-Chirurgical Society / by Nelson C. Dobson.

  • Dobson, Nelson Congreve, 1845-1919.
Date:
1889
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Some surgical aspects of carcinoma : the presidential addres, delivered Oct. 9th, 1889, at the opening of the 16th session of the Bristol Medico-Chirurgical Society / by Nelson C. Dobson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    may be. I have no doubt, if a poll were taken of this meeting, that there would be a pretty general agreement in the opinion expressed by Sir Spencer Wells. This observer states, that in studying the reports of the Regis- trar General, the death-rate from cancer in 1884 was higher than in any previous year, and also that in three successive periods of ten years from 1851 to 1880, and in the seven following years to 1887, there had been a gradual increase of mortality from cancer,—an increase common to both sexes, but considerably greater in males than in females. I will not trouble you with statistics which are open to all of you, but will content myself by stating that from the year 1861 to 1887 there had been a steady increase in the deaths from cancer among one million persons living, as shown from the fact that the deaths in 1861 from cancer were 360 per million; in 1887 they had reached 606 per million. These facts speak for them- selves, and cannot be accounted for by better diagnosis or more careful registration : they should stimulate every one of us to increased energy, and enquiry as to the cause of this great increase in a malady so terrible, and I am fain to confess, so little as yet amenable to treatment; an mcrease, too, which makes itself apparent in the later periods of middle-life—the period of greatest usefulness and responsibility. It is stated also, on the authority of Dr. Fordyce Barker—whose acquaintance I had the pleasure of making in America two years ago, and who is known throughout the world as an eminent and careful physician,—that a like increase has been observed in the United States, and he specially mentions that in the city of N ew York the death-rate from cancer has risen from 400 to the million in 1875 to 530 in 1885. He also says, 2