A visit to the old operating theatre and the Herb Garratt is the best way to learn about medical care in the nineteenth century.Do you agree with this statement ?

The roll play taught me that the patient had to be held down by many dressers to stop them moving because of the excruciating pain that they went through during an operation. We did not learn much about the pain the patients were going through when we were at the old operating threatre, we had learnt about this before. We did not get the full feeling of how hot, stuffy and noisy it would have been for the operations in the 1800's as there was only about

thirty of us in the threatre that day, unlike the hundreds of people in the 1800's. We had to be quite to listen to the explanation of the roll play, so we did not get the idea of how nosy it would have been. It did however show and explain to us how the instruments were used to make the most out of the surgeon's speed. We got shown that the surgeon did not wash his hands before an operation and that he and the dressers wore blood stained aprons, we had been taught previously about this causing the spread of infection. I was not expecting to be told about this, as germs were not discovered until the 1860's. We were told that the instruments could not be sterilized because of the metal that they were made of. I feel that the roll play was the most informative part of the day.

The talk brought surgery back to life, as being told real accounts of what happened in the old operating threatre, while being there made you feel that you could have been there at the time. From the talk we learnt that up to two hundred people would stand in the tiers and watch operations. We learnt that there were no anesthetics and that the male patients could be knocked out by boxers from carnivals, however the females could not have had this done to them, as the boxers would not hit any women. Many families gave their relatives alcohol to try to numb the pain during the operations, but this thinned the blood and made patients bleed quicker, not helping the problem of bleeding. We also learnt that up to forty thousand leeches were used to clean the patient's blood in only one year. As it took up to ten months for the leeches to digest the blood, the blood was squeezed out of the leeches (a form of recycling) this saved the hospital a great amount of money. During the talk we also learnt that women patients were offered a blindfold to wear during their operation, as all of the students that were watching were male. They thought that women should not have to see the men staring and laughing at them. Although the talk was not very interesting, we learnt a great deal about new aspects of surgery that we did not already know.

As well as visiting the old operating threatre we also visited the adjoining Herb Garrat. There we were told about how Pare's Salve was made and what ingredients were involved. We were shown how pills were rolled out into thin sausage like rolls and then pushed along a grooved table to cut them into individual pills. They were then put into a sphere shaped pill silverer, doing this meant that the pills could be sold for a great deal more. We were also shown how pressed pills were made, by pressing the liquid out of the herb. This brought to life the medicines that we had already learnt about. However we did not learn about remedies that were given by quacks (traveling doctors) or treatments given by apothecaries (pharmacies). This part of the day was good because we could try to make the medicines ourselves. The only bad part was that some aspects were left out.

We learnt about nursing techniques and methods from the Florence Nightingale exhibition. It was very informative, but not very exciting or interesting. The new methods were important to St. Thomas's Hospital as they helped to move on the nursing area of medical treatment in the 1800's. We found out that hospital wards housed and cared for the poor, sick people who had no money for private treatment. To save money in the hospital the bed sheets were not cleaned, they were left covered in blood and pus, only lice were picked out of the sheets, this again helped to spread infection between patients. As did old sheets being torn up into pieces and then being used as bandages for wounds. We did not learn about how rich people would have been cared for by doctors at home or how their family cared for people. I feel that these were the only parts missing from this area.

We did not really get told about preventative medicines. Vaccinations were mentioned, but not in detail. At that time public health was a problem, this was talked about but not in great detail. In the 1800's there were no real sewers so disease was transmitted through this. Many poor people did not have proper housing leaving them prone to disease. I feel that the area of preventative medicine was a let down as we were not told or shown much about the area of medicine. Also we did not learn about anesthetics or antiseptics, I think that this was because these things were not in wide use until after the hospital was shut in 1862, so they would not have been used at the old operating threatre. Visiting just the old operating threatre does not tell us about all operations as they may have been carried out in different way in different places.

In conclusion I do feel that visiting the old operating threatre is better than learning from a book as it brought things to life especially the roll play and demonstrations in the Herb Garratt. However some important aspects were left out. On its own it is not the best way to learn about all medical care in the nineteenth century, as it does not explain the full picture. Different information would come from different places and things, which took place in different places, would not be the same. You would need to study all methods of treatments from the 1800's to get a fully balanced picture of medical care at that time, as some things may be biased or incorrect. So I do agree that a visit to the old operating threatre is the best way to learn about medical care in the nineteenth century. It would however be combined with other sources of information to get the full balanced picture.

Simon Owen - 10J

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Simon Owen