352 SURGERY 



It was seven years after this last American operation before ovario- 

 tomy was first performed in England, and nearly 15 years before 

 ovariotomy was first performed in France. In 1870 T. Gaillard 

 Thomas first devised and performed successfully a vaginal ovario- 

 tomy. In 1872 Dr. Davis, of Pennsylvania, performed successfully 

 the same operation, followed in 1873 by Gilmore of Alabama, and 

 in 1874 by Battey of Georgia, and later by Sims. In 1872 Battey 

 performed his first oophorectomy, "with a view to establish at once 

 the change of life for the effectual remedy of certain otherwise incur- 

 able maladies." This is an operation also of purely American origin, 

 and has contributed much to the relief of human suffering. It has 

 been urged that while to an American surgeon the credit is honestly 

 due for the first performance of an ovariotomy, other nations 

 have perfected the operation, and more credit is due to-day to 

 other nations for the best results. Let us see how this statement 

 accords with facts. In 1857 the question of ovariotomy was brought 

 up for discussion at the French Academy of Medicine, and only 

 one surgeon considered the operation as sometimes justifiable. Up to 

 that time there had been in America 97 ovariotomies, with 34% 

 mortality; in Great Britain, 123 operations, with 43 % mortality; and 

 in Germany, 47 operations, with 77% mortality. American sur- 

 geons, therefore, not only obtained the best results up to that date, 

 but no American surgeon to-day will concede that our results are 

 inferior to those obtained by surgeons in any other country at the 

 present time. Few men can realize the influence of McDowell's first 

 ovariotomy upon the whole field of abdominal surgery. It is, indeed, 

 a sublime thought to consider that a man was found with the courage 

 of his convictions to do what no man had ever done, and to operate 

 with the noise of an infuriated mob beneath his windows. This 

 mob would have lynched him if the patient upon whom this first 

 ovariotomy was performed had died. Having escaped the angry 

 mob, he was pointed out as a murderer by his fellow colleagues, and 

 was condemned by the highest scientific authorities in Europe. In 

 America, therefore, under such circumstances and under such con- 

 ditions, the birth of the greatest operation in surgery occurred an 

 operation which saves now the lives of millions of women. Keen 

 asserts that "it is estimated that one million years are added every 

 three years to the life of women in this country alone by a single 

 operation of ovariotomy." 



The disapproval of this great operation of McDowell's by the press, 

 by the profession, and by the laity was pronounced. The Medico- 

 Chirurgical Review, speaking of McDowell's achievement, says: 

 "A back settlement of America, Kentucky, has beaten the Mother 

 Country, nay, Europe itself, with all the boasted surgeons thereof, 

 n the fearful and formidable operation of gastrotomy with extrac- 



