Anaesthetics and Surgery's Black Period (1 janv. 1850 – 1 janv. 1870)

Description:

In 1800, surgery was very dangerous and had a low success rate. This was due to three major reasons:
- Pain: there were no anaesthetics to sedate patients during surgery, so they would have been in a lot of pain and in need of restraint.
- Infection: there were no antiseptics or knowledge of germs so there was no cleanliness, and people were at high risk of infection.
- Bleeding: there were no blood transfusions, and despite cauterisation and ligatures, many patients died from blood loss.

There were many developments made in anaesthetics throughout the 1800s, with the most successful being James Simpson's discovery of chloroform in 1847. However, early anaesthetics actually led to a 'Black Period' between 1850 and 1870. Anaesthetics led to longer and more complex operations, which led to higher death rates from infection as surgeons didn't know that poor hygiene spread disease: they didn't often clean their clothes, which were covered in dried blood and pus from previous operations; operations were carried out in unhygienic areas and conditions; and operating instruments were unwashed and dirty.

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