260 PRINCIPLES OF VETERINARY SURGERY 



laid out on the instrument table to cool or else placed in 

 the three-per-cent carbolic solution. Only all-steel instru- 

 ments can be thus treated. The catheter, the rubber 

 syringe, the syringe with a leather plunger, the rubber- 

 handled knife, the rubber-handled trephine, etc., must be 

 placed in the 95 per cent carbolic acid. 



3. The Surgeon's Hands. — As conveyors of infection 

 into wounds, the hands of the veterinary surgeon stand 

 first. They are always dangerous. If the cleanest hands 

 of the cleanest human surgeon are never absolutely safe, 

 what must be said of the .hands of the veterinarian, who, 

 just a moment before beginning the operation, must handle 

 all kinds of infected objects — the halter, the patient, the 

 casting ropes, etc. ? In dealing with this item the veter- 

 inarian must first cope with the fact that the human skin 

 is never entirely aseptic and that the very dirty hands can- 

 not be rapidly rendered safely clean. The hands are capa- 

 ble of carrying dangerous infective microbes for several 

 days after being contaminated. If we cope with a putrid 

 foetus or placenta, no washing will make the hands safe 

 enough to operate upon a cryptorchid within twenty-four 

 hours. If a putrid fistula is handled one moment and a 

 horse castrated the next, although the hands have been 

 cleansed, serious results may follow. These facts are well 

 established by experience. 



The most important precaution to take in this connec- 

 tion is to avoid manual manipulations of surgical wounds 

 as much as possible. It is remarkable how little one really 

 needs to touch the surgical wound, if appropriate use is 

 made of the dissecting forceps, the tenaculum, the retrac- 

 tors, the rat-tooth forceps, and the needle-holder. While 

 there are operations in which the fingers must be used, 

 there are indeed many in which the handling of the tis- 

 sues is entirely unnecessary. To learn to avoid the direct 



