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Tuesday, September 17, 2002In 1942, one of his obstetrics patients contracted scarlet fever, which caused a miscarriage and subsequent streptococcus infection. "Doctors had done everything possible, both surgically and medically," Dr. Hess said in a 1998 interview with Katie Krauss, the editor of Yale-New Haven Magazine and one of the many babies Dr. Hess delivered. "I went to see her and knew she was dying." Dr. Hess wanted to talk to her internist, Dr. John Bumstead, and found him asleep in the library. "While I was waiting for him to wake up," Dr. Hess said, "I sat and read the latest Reader's Digest, in which there was an article called `Germ Killers From Earth,' about the use of soil bacteria to kill streptococcal infection in animals." He asked Dr. Bumstead, "Wouldn't it be wonderful if we had something like this gramicidin mentioned in the Reader's Digest?" This prompted Dr. Bumstead to speak with some colleagues who were studying penicillin and to obtain some for the patient, Anne Miller. The day after her first injection, Mrs. Miller's fever broke. She lived to be 90 years old, dying in 1999. Try to imagine something like that happening in today’s litiginous environment. Imagine if it didn’t work and the patient died , as she would have without the antibiotics. Can’t you just hear the prosecuting lawyer, “And what was that you gave the patient? An extract of mold? And where did you learn about it? The Reader’s Digest?” posted by Sydney on 9/17/2002 05:53:00 AM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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