Kitchen-table medicine
CMAJ 1999;160:22
Catharine Dewar's thoughtful, well-written and poignant article about Evelyn and her experience with balloon pneumoplasty1 [full text] reminded me of my now-deceased father, John McLennan, born in August 1901. The first time that I can remember seeing him naked to the waist was when I was a teenager (he was very Scottish). I noted with much curiosity and a little horror a remarkably invaginated scar in the midaxillary line of his lower left chest wall. I was told that this scar was the result of an operation performed in his home to treat empyema. My father actually used that word to describe the condition and told me that a section of rib had been taken out to accomplish the drainage. He was quite certain that the operation had taken place in his preteen years, as his father had not yet gone off to fight with the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders in World War I.
My father emigrated from Scotland to Canada with his family in 1906, and the surgery was performed in Hamilton, Ont. Thus, the operation can be dated to between 1907 and 1914. After I became a physician, I began to wonder about the details of his ordeal. For instance, why resect a portion of rib? Would that not have posed a risk of osteomyelitis? Perhaps the offending organism was not a bone invader. Unfortunately, our curiosity often does not develop until the sources of information are unable to help with the answers.
I know that my father made a good recovery, because he used to show me photos of him (in his early 20s) and his team-mates on the ironically named "Tin Ribs" basketball team. I cannot say whether he had to blow up balloons as part of his recovery.
D. William McLennan, MD
Grimsby, Ont.
 |
Send a letter to the editor Envoyez une lettre à la rédaction |
Reference
- Dewar C. Balloon pneumoplasty, 1926. CMAJ 1998;159(1):61-2.
