Page:A cyclopedia of American medical biography vol. 1.djvu/56

 xlvi INTRODUCTION

contributions to medical literature. ("H'story of Early Operations for Fibroid Tumors," "American Journal of Obstetrics," vol. xl, 1899.)

In 1S44 Washington L. Atlee did a successful myomectomy. ("The Surgical Treatment of Certain Fibrous Tumors of the Uterus," New York, 1853.)

In 1846 John Bellinger did a deliberate hystero-myomectomy on a colored woman, using "animal ligatures;" the patient died of peritonitis on the fifth day.

In 1853 Walter Burnham, of Lowell, Massachusetts, did a successful hystero-myomectomy, being forced to remove the tumor which had become extruded from the incision. (" Boston Medical and Surgical Journal," January, 1SS3.)

In the same year Gilman Kimball (1804—1892), of Lowell, Massachu- setts, did the first successful operation deliberately undertaken.

In 1884 T. A. Emmet operated for a fibroid cyst, amputating the uterus at the vaginal junction. The cervical stump was shut in by bring- ing the two raw surfaces in contact, the portion of the bladder which had been dissected off was then drawn over the stump so as to cover it with a hood, and the whole was thus placed outside of the peritoneum. ("Principles and Practice of Gynecology," T. A. Emmet, second edition.)

While Koeberle of Strasburg, Hegar of Freiberg, Schroeder of Berlin, Tait of Birmingham, and Keith of Edinburgh were making Herculean efforts to perfect the radical operation for fibroid tumors by treating the pedicle of the tumor (the neck of the womb) with various adjustable cable constricting devices to control the hemorrhage and expose it to view by suturing it in the lower angle of the wound outside of the perito- neum to control sepsis, Joseph Eastman of Indianapolis, F. Krug, and William M. Polk of New York were endeavoring to get rid of the sloughing stump by doing a panhysterectomy.

H. T. Byford devised an extraperitoneal method of treating the stump called vaginal fixation of the stump in abdominal hysterectomy. (" Trans- actions American Gynecological Society," vol xiv, 18S9, vol. xv, 1890.)

Mary A. Dixon Jones, of Brooklyn, reported a " complete hystero- myomectomy" in the "New York Medical Journal" for August and September, 1888, following a plan proposed in the "Medical Record," December 24, 1887, of removing the large uterine tumor above and extracting the cervix by the vagina so as to "leave the vaginal opening in the best and most natural way of drainage."

In 1889 L. A. Stimson, of New York, wrote on "Some Modifications in Technic of Abdominal Surgery" and proposed the abandonment of the mass ligatures, adopting the ligation of the cardinal vessels instead. ("Medical News," Philadelphia, 1889.) This simple idea of Stimson's proved to be the egg of Columbus in the treatment of these hitherto