Almanac chapter 9: Medicine and the Human Machine

                                     Chapter 9

                           MEDICINE AND THE HUMAN MACHINE


                                 A Medical History

              In  ancient  Japan, teeth were extracted by dentists who used
         only their fingers.

              Hundreds of years ago, Chinese doctors were not paid by their
         sick patients, but only by those who they kept healthy.

              In the times of  Aristotle,  the  Greek  philosopher,  people
         thought  that the liver, not the heart, was the center of emotion.
         Now we know that it is not the heart, either.

              Before giving up on a patient they couldn't cure, doctors  in
         the  Middle  East  used  to  display that patient in the center of
         town, in case a passerby might speak up with a cure.

              After reading the books that interested him, Hippocrates (for
         whom the Hippocratic oath of medicine is named) supposedly  burned
         down  a  library, so that his competitors would not have access to
         the same information.

              The barber's pole dates from the time when barbers were  also
         surgeons. It represents a bandage wrapped around an injured arm.

              The   Rx   sign  that  pharmacists  use  was  originally  the
         astrological sign for Jupiter.

              While Europeans were dying by the thousands, the Chinese were
         using a vaccination  against  smallpox.   They  would  inhale  the
         powdered material from the sores of a smallpox victim.

              One  of  the remedies recommended for the Black Plague was to
         put the intestines of young pigeons or puppies on the forehead.

              A medical curiosity was David Kennison, who was born in  1736
         and   participated  in  the  Boston  Tea  Party.  At  the  age  of
         seventy-six, serving in the War of 1812,  he  lost  a  hand  to  a
         gunshot  wound.   Later,  a  tree  fell  on him, and fractured his
         skull.  Some years later, while training soldiers in the use of  a
         cannon,  something went wrong and an explosion shattered his legs.
         He recovered. Yet later,  a  horse  damaged  his  face.   He  died
         peacefully in 1851 at the age of 115.

              Cataract surgery (removal of lens from eye) was first done in
         1748. But the first anesthesia wasn't until 1842!

              In 1809, a woman had a twenty-two pound ovarian tumor removed
         without anesthesia.


         Here is some advice from a book 132 years  old: (this is no longer
         corsidered correct)

              "DROWNING.  - Attend to the following  essential  rules:
              -  1. Lose no time. 2. Handle the body gently.  3. Carry
              the body with the head gently raised, and never hold  it
              up   by   the  feet.  4.  Send  for  medical  assistance
              immediately, and in the  meantime  act  as  follows:  1.
              Strip the body, rub it dry: then rub it in hot blankets,
              and  place  it in a warm bed in a warm room. 2.  Cleanse
              away the  froth  and mucus from the  nose  and mouth. 3.
              Apply  warm  bricks,  bottles,  bags of sand, &c. to the
              arm-pits, between the thighs and soles of the  feet.  4.
              Rub the  surface of the body with the hands  enclosed in
              warm dry worsted socks. 5. If  possible,  put  the  body
              into  a warm bath. 6. To restore breathing, put the pipe
              of a common bellows into one nostril, carefully  closing
              the  other  and  the  mouth;  at  the same  time drawing
              downwards, and pushing gently  backwards the upper  part
              of  the windpipe, to allow a more free admission of air;
              blow the bellows gently, in order to inflate the  lungs,
              till the  breast be raised a little;  then set the mouth
              and nostrils free, and press gently on the chest; repeat
              this until  signs  of life  appear.   When  the  patient
              revives  apply  smelling-salts  to  the  nose, give warm
              wine or brandy and water.  Cautions.  1. Never  rub  the
              body  with  salt  or spirits.  2. Never roll the body on
              casks. 3. Continue the remedies for twelve hours without
              ceasing."

              And from that same old book:

              "LEECHES AND THEIR APPLICATION. -  The  leech  used  for
              medical  purposes  is  called the hirudo Medicinatis, to
              distinguish  it  from  other  varieties,  such  as   the
              horse-leech  and the Lisbon leech. It varies from two to
              four inches in  length,  and  is  of  a  blackish  brown
              colour,  marked  on  the back with six yellow spots, and
              edged with a fellow line on each side. Formerly  leeches
              were supplied by Sweden but latterly most of the leeches
              are  procured  from  France, where they are now becoming
              scarce.
                   When leeches are applied to a part,  it  should  be
              thoroughly  freed  from down or hair by shaving, and all
              liniments, &c., carefully and effectually  cleaned  away
              by  washing.  If  the leech is hungry it will soon bite,
              but sometimes great difficulty is experienced in getting
              them to fasten on. When this is the case, roll the leech
              into a little porter, or  moisten  the  surface  with  a
              little  blood,  or milk, or sugar and water, Leeches may
              be applied by holding them over the port with a piece of
              linen cloth or by means  of  an  inverted  glass,  under
              which they must be placed.
                   When  applied  to the gums, care should be taken to
              us a a leech glass, as they are apt to  creep  down  the
              patient's  throat;  a large swan's quill will answer the
              purpose of a leech glass. When leeches are  gorged  they
              will  drop  off  themselves;  never tear them off from a
              person., but just dip the point of  a  moistened  finger
              into some salt and touch them with it.
                   Leeches  are supposed to abstract about two drachms
              of blood, or six leeches draw about an ounce;  but  this
              is independent of the bleeding after they have come off,
              and more blood generally flows then than during the time
              they are sucking."

              One  hundred  years  ago (1890), in Connecticut, Idaho, North
         Carolina, Oregon, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia, it was legal
         to practice medicine with no training whatsoever.  Texas, however,
         required a high school diploma.

              Surgeons used to have to operate quickly, before the patients
         died of extreme pain or blood loss. Robert Liston worked  so  fast
         that  one  day  he accidentally cut off his nurse's fingers. It is
         not known whether the rest of the operation was a success.

              As  late  as  34  years  after  the  public  introduction  of
         anesthesia,  some  doctors  refused  to use it. Some said that the
         shock of pain is a necessary ingredient to recovery.  Others  were
         afraid,  because  some preachers said that anesthesia was the work
         of the devil.

              Most people  don't  realize  that  Charles  Lindbergh  was  a
         pioneer  in  medical  technology. He worked on an early heart-lung
         machine.

              The flu mutated into a killer in 1918 and killed  20  million
         people. Over half a million Americans died.

              In 1976, doctors in Los Angeles went on strike because of the
         rising   cost   of   malpractice   insurance.   All  elective  and
         non-emergency surgery and medical attention were canceled.  During
         that time, eighteen percent less people died than usual.

              From  all  our  exposure  to  unnecessary  penicillin through
         medication as well  as  through  treatment  of  cattle  and  pork,
         life-threatening  bacteria  have grown resistant to our number-one
         line of defense.  In 1960, 13% of  staphylococci  infections  were
         resistant to penicillin. Now, 91% are resistant to penicillin.

              There  were 1,647 heart transplants in 1988. There were 1,700
         liver transplants in 1988.

              In the future people will be able to regrow missing  arms  or
         legs  like  a  salamander can grow a new tail.  Research has shown
         promising results in getting bone to grow with the application  of
         electricity.  Children under age five who lose the tip of a finger
         up to half-way to the outermost  joint,  if  left  untreated,  the
         finger  will  completely  regrow. If medical attention is applied,
         stitches for example, the child's finger will not regrow.

              In   Tibet,   monks   occasionally  performed  brain  surgery
         successfully.  They would bore a hole through a person's  forehead
         and  insert a tube into their pineal gland, at the bottom of their
         brain. This was to induce a "mystical state of consciousness."

                               Medical Miscellaneous

              Dr. James Muatt lived to the age of 120 and spent 95 years in
         the practice of medicine.

              Two of every five Americans have never been to a dentist.


                                  Modern Medicine

              One  out  of  every eight Americans will spend some time as a
         patient in a hospital this year.

              There is a phenomenon  called  noscomial  disease.  It  means
         coming to a hospital for some reason, and catching another disease
         while  in the hospital.  Hospitals are not healthy places. One out
         of every 21 Americans admitted will catch  something  else  merely
         from  being  in the hospital.  Every year, 15,000 Americans die of
         something other than what they were admitted for.

              Of all the people who  work  in  hospitals,  only  1.78%  are
         doctors. 17.27% are clerical workers. So there are nine times more
         people  involved  with  the  paperwork, than those involved in the
         actual work!

              An  average  person in America who is over 65 years old takes
         between ten and twenty prescription pills every day.

              A woman started showing a  bunch  of  general  symptoms  that
         doctors  could  not diagnose. She went from one doctor to another.
         One recommended that she have her uterus  removed.   Finally,  her
         problem  was  relieved  by  a  dentist.   He  discovered  she  was
         suffering mercury poisoning from her  fillings.   He  removed  the
         fillings and substituted another material.

              EEG  and  EKG  machines  are  not  perfect.  In one study EKG
         machines indicated a heart problem in healthy people  20%  of  the
         time.   Sometimes  in  a  room with more than one EKG, one machine
         will read the electrical leaks of another.   In  another  study  a
         researcher  hooked  up an EEG to a mannequin whose head was filled
         with lime jello and the EEG found signs of life.

              The average doctor goes to medical school for four years, yet
         gets only two and a half hours of education  on  nutrition  as  it
         applies to preventive medicine or curative medicine.

              16 out of every 100 doctors will be sued this year.

              A  sociologist  did  a  study  that turned up some mortifying
         results.  It seems that the people who work in hospital  emergency
         rooms  are  more  likely  to  administer resuscitation attempts on
         patients who are brought in dead on arrival who are good  looking,
         than on those patients who are uglier.

              Anyone  who  thinks Western medicine is a joke should realize
         that in Guinea, where modern medicine is not practiced,  over  75%
         of the people die before the age of 50.


                                      Surgery

              Theoretically,  a human can survive without the stomach, most
         of the intestines, one kidney, 3/4 of the  liver,  and  one  lung.
         Furthermore,  the  legs  and  arms  and  sex organs can be removed
         successfully. Don't try this at home.

                          A Case of Do-it-Yourself Surgery
              In the 1600's a locksmith was suffering from bladder  stones.
         Being  a locksmith, he was used to logical repairs to problems. He
         took matters into his own hands, and removed his own bladder stone
         with a kitchen knife.

              In  Kenya,  African  fire  ants are what doctors use to close
         surgical wounds in place of sutures. The ant is  induced  to  bite
         the two sides of the wound with its mandibles, and hang on.

              The  longest  operation  on  record  took  96  hours.  During
         February 4 - 8, 1951, surgeons in Michigan removed an ovarian cyst
         from a woman.  When they were done, she weighed 308 lbs less.

              Joseph Ascough who was born in 1935 holds the record for  the
         most  major  operations. He has had 327 surgeries for warts in his
         windpipe.

              Sometimes  doctors  make  mistakes  that  are   like   simple
         bookkeeping errors.  Surgeons once removed a kidney from a man who
         had  a  kidney  tumor.  The problem was that they removed the good
         kidney. And they have been known to  saw  the  wrong  leg  off  an
         amputee.

              Sometimes  surgeons  take  an  organ totally out of a person,
         overhaul it on a workbench, like a car mechanic working on a power
         steering unit, then re-install it. This is done  most  often  with
         kidneys to remove difficult tumors.

              Want  to improve your vision without using glasses or contact
         lenses.  Here's what you do: 1. Get a donated cornea. 2.  Cool  it
         to  -70 degrees. 3. Fasten it on a lathe and trim it to the proper
         shape to refocus light. 4. Stitch it on over your present  cornea.
         -  Or have an eye surgeon do it for you. This new technique is now
         in frequent use.

              One out of every 243 Americans will have plastic surgery this
         year.

              There is a new twist in plastic surgery. Surgeons can take  a
         bone  from  your body, smash it into paste, then mold it like clay
         into a new shape and replace it.  This  has  been  done  with  one
         seven-year-old  boy  whose skull was  misshapen. They  removed the
         whole top of his head, pulverized it, then re-formed it and put it
         back on.  The headache the boy suffered was less than the ones  he
         was  otherwise  doomed  to  due to the previous shape of his head.
         Perhaps surgeons of the future should be encouraged to  play  with
         Play-Doh when they are growing up.


                                       Birth

              Scientists are working on the possibility of removing a dying
         woman's ovaries and save the eggs so that the woman can still have
         children, even after she is dead.

              If  you split a human embryo when it is less than a week old,
         identical twins will develop. This is already done with cattle.

              Fetuses have gills.

              One out of every 88 births is twins.

              One out of every 512,000 births is quadruplets.

              One out of every 16 children are born with defects.  Most  of
         these  are  minor, such as the babies born with tails. When a baby
         is born with a tail, the doctors  cut  it  off  right  away.  Most
         people do not know if they had a tail.

              "Ten  years  ago  80%  of underweight, premature babies died,
         while today 80% survive." - Allan Maurer

              "If you're pregnant, you go to the doctor and he  treats  you
         as  if  you're sick. Childbirth is a nine-month disease which must
         be treated, so  you're  sold  on  intravenous  fluid  bags,  fetal
         monitors, a host of drugs, the totally unnecessary episiotomy, and
         -  the  top  of  the line product - the Caesarean delivery!" - Dr.
         Robert S.  Mendelsohn, from his book,  Confessions  of  a  Medical
         Heretic

              The  infant mortality rate in Canada is 25 percent lower than
         in America.

              In 1793, in France a true cyclops was born. She  was  a  girl
         who lived to fifteen years old. She had a single eye in the middle
         of her face.

              In  Finland  babies were born in saunas until the 1920's. The
         babies probably were more comfortable arriving  in  a  dark,  warm
         room than in a bright, cold hospital room.