A probationary essay on some circumstances to be considered in resorting to the operation of bronchotomy : submitted by authority of the president and his council to the examination of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh when candidate for admission into their body, in conformity to their regulations respecting the admission of ordinary fellows / by George Stewart Newbigging.

  • Newbigging, George Stewart, -1840.
Date:
1837
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A probationary essay on some circumstances to be considered in resorting to the operation of bronchotomy : submitted by authority of the president and his council to the examination of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh when candidate for admission into their body, in conformity to their regulations respecting the admission of ordinary fellows / by George Stewart Newbigging. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    14/72 (page 4)
    It must be evident, that the indiscriminate re- course to any mode of treatment in medicine is both unsatisfactory and discreditable to the science, and in surgery, in like manner, without due indica- tion for its employment, no operation ought to be undertaken. The surgeon, besides attending to the symptoms which would point to its adoption, shQuld also weigh well those which may tend to dis- courage him from attempting it. In many cases, it is to be feared, bronchotomy has been resorted to where it could be productive of no real benefit, while in many too it has been omitted, where, in the present state of pathological science, there is ground for believing that it might advantageously have been performed. It may be argued that in the catalogue of unfortunate cases, where it has been tried, the surgeon at least gave the patient a chance of life, which at the time was fast ebbing, and must at any rate have sunk ; but it should be kept in mind, that by thus having recourse to an operation with- out the existence of a favourable prospect of success, there is attached to the remedy an opprobrium which must ultimately prejudice the pubUc against its adoption under any circumstances, and thus by using it where success cannot reasonably be anticipated, greater difficulty will be encountered in obtaining its performance in those other cases