It is
difficult to convince the majority of physicians, and even ourselves,
that to touch a finger to a door knob, to an assistant's clothing, or
to one's own body, may vitiate the entire operation by introducing one
or two microbic germs into the wound.
An illustration of how carefully the various steps of an operation
should be guarded is afforded by the appended rules, which I have
adopted at the Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia for the guidance of
the assistants and nurses. If such rules were taught every medical
student and every physician entering practice as earnestly as the
paragraphs of the catechism are taught the Sunday school pupil (and
they certainly ought to be so taught) the occurrence of suppuration,
hectic fever, septicaemia, pyaemia, and surgical erysipelas would be
practically unknown. Death, then, would seldom occur after surgical
operations, except from hemorrhage, shock, or exhaustion.
I have taken the liberty of bringing here a number of culture tubes
containing beautiful specimens of some of the more common and
interesting bacteria. The slimy masses seen on the surfaces of jelly
contained in the tubes are many millions of individual plants, which
have aggregated themselves in various forms as they have been
developed as the progeny of the few parent cells planted in the jelly
as a nutrient medium or soil.
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