Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 83.djvu/591

Rh the last few years. however, more funds have been available for this work and much has been done to improve the teaching of veterinary medicine both in treatment and in general hygiene.

As an illustration, perhaps the most important advance in the humane treatment of suffering animals has been in the use of anesthetics. Formerly all operations were performed on animals without the use of any agent to deaden pain. To a considerable degree that practise is continued, but the more progressive surgeons use ether, chloroform, ether cocaine or other general or local anesthetics in painful operations. This is one of the blessings modern surgery has brought to dumb creation. The use of antiseptics in veterinary surgery is saving many animals from the painful and serious consequences of wound infection. The methods of restraining animals for operation are also being improved. Veterinary hospitals are increasing in number and popularity so that animals are receiving more humane treatment when it is necessary for them to come under the surgeon's knife. A like interest is being taken in the advancement of internal medicine. Methods of nursing sick animals that will give to the patient the greatest comfort possible are coming into use. The treatment in veterinary medicine is becoming as rational and as scientific as it is in human medicine. The unwarranted medications for animals that were reported in former times are rapidly disappearing.

With the development of the work in veterinary. colleges, all will be done that is possible by way of teaching efficient and humane methods of treatment. However, in the application of modern methods in veterinary medicine there are serious difficulties to be overcome. The veterinarian needs the moral support of the public in applying his art. The condition confronting him is complicated. The afflicted animal is conscious of pain. The operation necessary to restore it to usefulness is severe. The operator equips himself with disinfectants, sterilized instruments and proper dressings. Thus prepared he meets the owner. Shall the animal be restrained in the quickest way possible and operated upon without an anesthetic or shall the comfort of the animal be considered? Here the responsibility of the owner enters, for it is he who orders the work to be done and it is he who bears the expense. The use of anesthetics involves additional cost that some one must pay. It is in this particular that the efforts of the veterinarian to minimize suffering are often checked. What is true of surgery-applies to medicine when the proper care calls for additional expense. As the worth of the patient is usually measured in dollars, the amount to be expended for its recovery has its limitations. But a strong effort for humane treatment on the part of practitioners is tending to adjust many of these differences. However, society should take a positive stand on this subject in order to encourage those who are striving for better and more humane methods in treating sick and injured animals. A veterinarian of