Talk:William Stewart Halsted

Article Checklist for "William Stewart Halsted"

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Checklist last edited by	--Joe Quick (Talk) 21:53, 20 March 2007 (CDT)

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References

Rankin JS. William Stewart Halsted: a lecture by Dr. Peter D. Olch. [Biography. Historical Article. Lectures] Annals of Surgery. 243(3):418-25, 2006 Mar. Lecture given by a distinguished surgeon who had interned under Halsted, and went on to become Deputy Chief of the History of Medicine Division, National Library of Medicine of the USA. Lecture delivered when he held that office at the National Library of Medicine. UI: 16495709 - extended quote from close of this article: "I would like to close with this frequently quoted summation of Halsted's life by H.L. Mencken, certainly somebody who did not find it necessary to admire many men: “He was one of the first surgeons to employ courtesy in surgery, to show any consideration for the insides of a man he was operating on. The old method was to slit a man from the chin down, take out his bowels, and spread them on a towel while you sorted them. Halsted held that if you touched an intestine with your finger you injured it and the patient suffered the effects of the injury. That was a new doctrine when he began. Halsted introduced rubber gloves. He invented the technique of shutting off the area of operation, blocking it with shots of cocaine in the surrounding nerves so there would be less general shock. He was gentle and a little inhuman. He had to be because he was so sensitive. He married a Johns Hopkins nurse, the Confederate General Wade Hampton's daughter [actually it was his niece]. They lived a strange sequestered life in a great big house where each had his own quarters and neither saw anybody. Halsted had an odd detached way always, even when he was operating. He would start an operation, go on for a bit, and then seem to get tired and say to his assistant, ‘You see what I want to do, you finish it,’ and walk away. But Max Brödle, who worked with them all, always said Halsted was the pick of the Big Four. He knew ‘things.’” After his death, Dr. Halsted's influence spread throughout the United States, and indeed the world. Many important surgical programs, such as the one here at Duke, were started by Halsted's students. In many respects, all of surgery ultimately became “Halstedian.” Thank you."