A History Of Surgery

A history of key advances in surgery including primitive techniques. Includes a facsinating glimpse into the future of surgery.

MUSC: Waring Lib. copy: 2000, Gift of Dr. Marion C. Anderson.

The fascinating history of surgical practices through the ages—from the earliest operation of trepanning during the Stone Age and details of Egyptian surgery recovered on Papyri to the advent of science in surgery by William Harvey and John Hunter—is recorded in this comprehensive volume. Offering a wealth of information on various treatments, this compelling read offers a guide through the maze of impediments medicine has always faced—from condemnation by the church for heresy to rejected factual evidence due to slavish adherence to text widely revered for centuries. Following a historical time line, this exploration is of vital interest to historians and those intrigued by the development of medicine.

Surgeon Arnold van de Laar uses his own experience and expertise to tell this engrossing history of surgery through 28 famous operations—from Louis XIV and Einstein to JFK and Houdini. From the story of the desperate man from seventeenth-century Amsterdam who grimly cut a stone out of his own bladder to Bob Marley's deadly toe, Under the Knife offers a wealth of fascinating and unforgettable insights into medicine and history via the operating room. What happens during an operation? How does the human body respond to being attacked by a knife, a bacterium, a cancer cell or a bullet? And, as medical advances continuously push the boundaries of what medicine can cure, what are the limits of surgery? With stories spanning the dark centuries of bloodletting and amputations without anaesthetic through today's sterile, high-tech operating rooms, Under the Knife is both a rich cultural history, and a modern anatomy class for us all.

Today, astonishing surgical breakthroughs are making limb transplants, face transplants, and a host of other previously un dreamed of operations possible. But getting here has not been a simple story of medical progress. In Blood and Guts, veteran science writer Richard Hollingham weaves a compelling narrative from the key moments in surgical history. We have a ringside seat in the operating theater of University College Hospital in London as world-renowned Victorian surgeon Robert Liston performs a remarkable amputation in thirty seconds—from first cut to final stitch. Innovations such as Joseph Lister's antiseptic technique, the first open-heart surgery, and Walter Freeman's lobotomy operations, among other breakthroughs, are brought to life in these pages in vivid detail. This is popular science writing at it's best.

This handbook covers the technical, social and cultural history of surgery. It reflects the state of the art and suggests directions for future research. It discusses what is different and specific about the history of surgery - a manual activity with a direct impact on the patient’s body. The individual entries in the handbook function as starting points for anyone who wants to obtain up-to-date information about an area in the history of surgery for purposes of research or for general orientation. Written by 26 experts from 6 countries, the chapters discuss the essential topics of the field (such as anaesthesia, wound infection, instruments, specialization), specific domains areas (for example, cancer surgery, transplants, animals, war), but also innovative themes (women, popular culture, nursing, clinical trials) and make connections to other areas of historical research (such as the history of emotions, art, architecture, colonial history). Chapters 16 and 18 of this book are available open access under a CC BY 4.0 license at link.springer.com

Presents the leading personalities in the surgical field. Provides a biographical sketch of each of the surgeons, their contributions to surgery, and extracts of their writings. Covers the history of surgery from the time of the ancient Egyptians, to ancient China, India and Japan, to the Arabian peninsula, the Greeks, the Romans, the Middle ages, the 16th and 17th centuries, the 18th century and Lord Lister's contribution to antiseptic surgery and then the 20th century. The last period covers some major subdivisions of surgery such as hernia repair, abdominal surgery, surgery of the endocrine system, neurosurgery and thoracic surgery.

From an eminent surgeon and historian comes the “by turns fascinating and ghastly” (The New York Times Book Review, Editors’ Choice) story of surgery’s development—from the Stone Age to the present day—blending meticulous medical research with vivid storytelling. There are not many life events that can be as simultaneously frightening and hopeful as a surgical operation. In America, tens-of-millions of major surgical procedures are performed annually, yet few of us consider the magnitude of these figures because we have such inherent confidence in surgeons. And, despite passionate debates about health care and the media’s endless fascination with surgery, most of us have no idea how the first surgeons came to be because the story of surgery has never been fully told. Now, Empire of the Scalpel elegantly reveals surgery’s fascinating evolution from its early roots in ancient Egypt to its refinement in Europe and rise to scientific dominance in the United States. From the 16th-century saga of Andreas Vesalius and his crusade to accurately describe human anatomy while appeasing the conservative clergy who clamored for his burning at the stake, to the hard-to-believe story of late-19th century surgeons’ apathy to Joseph Lister’s innovation of antisepsis and how this indifference led to thousands of unnecessary surgical deaths, Empire of the Scalpel is both a global history and a uniquely American tale. You’ll discover how in the 20th century the US achieved surgical leadership, heralded by Harvard’s Joseph Murray and his Nobel Prize–winning, seemingly impossible feat of transplanting a kidney, which ushered in a new era of transplants that continues to make procedures once thought insurmountable into achievable successes. Today, the list of possible operations is almost infinite—from knee and hip replacement to heart bypass and transplants to fat reduction and rhinoplasty—and “Rutkow has a raconteur’s touch” (San Francisco Chronicle) as he draws on his five-decade career to show us how we got here. Comprehensive, authoritative, and captivating, Empire of the Scalpel is “a fascinating, well-rendered story of how the once-impossible became a daily reality” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review).