TREATMENT OF WOUNDS 75 



restore useless animals to their full value would be re- 

 garded as good investments. 



Operations upon cheap animals, performed with a thor- 

 oughness that makes for good results, will always amply 

 pay the surgeon in experience if not in money ; and this 

 experience can always be turned to good use when con- 

 ditions are more favorable for the collection of a good 

 fee. Any attempt to arrange prices on any other basis 

 is destined to failure. It is becoming more and more 

 evident that better surgery offers us the best oppor- 

 tunity to increase our incomes. 



A Few Words on Asepsis 



The precautions for preventing the contamination of 

 wounds while making them, or while treating those 

 accidentally inflicted, have revolutionized the surgical 

 art. To-day the surgeon must work religiously 

 throughout an operation to prevent the soiling of tis- 

 sues with infection, and this has greatly complicated 

 surgical technic. The mere cutting process is often 

 much simpler than that of preventing the open tis- 

 sue from becoming contaminated with pathogenic bac- 

 teria. Surgery includes to-day not only the classical 

 incisions, resections, and dissections, but also a compli- 

 cated prearranged plan for performing these opera- 

 tions without depositing harmful bacteria into the 

 trauma. The fact that bacteria are harbored upon and 

 within all objects directly and indirectly connected with 

 the procedure, calls for preventive measures that are by 

 no means easy to carry out. The prevention of opera- 

 tive infection requires knowledge of bacteriology and 

 pathology that is not possessed by the charlatan, and 

 it is here that the educated practitioner can find the 

 greatest weapon to use against his charlatan competitor. 



