They were dirty places, and so many people died there, hospitals often demanded money upfront to cover burials.
"He never really saw the hospital as the only place a surgeon would operate." In the 19th century, many surgeons operated in homes and offices because middle-class people didn't want to go to hospitals. "He didn't think that was attainable," says Fitzharris. (Antiseptic surgery uses germ-fighting techniques, the aseptic technique requires the creation of a germ-free environment, which is how operating rooms are run today.) Near the end of Lister's career, when he has been honored and knighted for pioneering antiseptic surgery, a new idea comes along called aseptic surgery, but Lister didn't buy it. "He joked later in life that he was the only man able to plunge a knife into the queen and survive that experience." Goats and Soda Imagine: Facing Surgery Without An Anesthesiologist On Hand Before the surgery, Lister's assistant sprayed carbolic acid with a machine Lister invented called the donkey engine all over the operation area, sterilizing it but also accidentally spraying the queen in the face. Lister was the closest surgeon to the queen's residence in Scotland, Fitzharris says, so she directed Lister to come drain a large abscess growing under her armpit. "In a plot twist worthy of a public TV period piece miniseries," notes Siegel, "Queen Victoria was a catalyst for wide acceptance of antiseptic surgery." "It was hard for people to believe, because here comes this young guy saying there's these invisible creatures and you can't see them with your eye but they're killing your patients," she tells Siegel. It tells the story of how the forward-thinking Lister changed medicine forever by getting other surgeons to understand that germs spread disease but that they could something about it.Īuthor Lindsey Fitzharris tells All Things Considered host Robert Siegel The Butchering Art "is a love story between science and medicine." Lister's technique of spraying antiseptic on surgical equipment (he had nothing to do with the mouthwash Listerine, but his technique inspired it) slowly caught on. How?Ī new biography of surgeon Joseph Lister called The Butchering Art is not about food. Your purchase helps support NPR programming. Close overlay Buy Featured Book Title The Butchering Art Subtitle Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine Author Lindsey Fitzharris
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