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A review by kblincoln
Dr. Mütter's Marvels: A True Tale of Intrigue and Innovation at the Dawn of Modern Medicine by Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz
5.0
Dr Thomas Mutter was a Philadelphia Surgeon in the time straddling the non-use of anesthesia and the use of anesthesia in surgery in the United States.
He was a dude. And this book is an utterably readable, interesting, and horrifying account of some of the major medical developments and political struggles in Philadelphia at the time right before the Civil War.
So Dr. Mutter is that dude who collected grotesque human abnormalities, stuck them in pickling jars or made plaster casts, and then used them as props in his medical classes at Jefferson Medical College. After he died, he donated the whole shebang and it became this very gruesome but cool museum my father took me to in elementary school.
So when I saw this book, I was all over it. My usual caveats: I am a lit major and I tend to like science stories that filter the science through human relationships.
This book does that admirably. We get Mutter's early life and struggle as a dandified perfectionist newcomer in the old boys society of Philadelphia medicine. We get his professional struggles with colleagues over the then-controversial topics of whether surgeons can spread communicable disease (should they wash their hands? No? They can just wear the same blood-spattered jacket for every patient that day?) and whether surgery should be done with anesthesia (need an extra three guys to hold down the leg amputation patient so he won't thrash around? But using anesthesia means the surgeon can't gauge their surgery by the screams and moans).
Dr. Mutter comes off as a crazy-ambidextrously skilled surgeon with more than the usual concern with pre- and after- care for his patients. He was forward-thinking, and entirely devoted to his profession in this book. I couldn't help feeling sympathetic and grateful as the book describes one time he had to perform a cleft palate/lip surgery and spent hours beforehand massaging the poor man's face to help prepare and familiarize the patient's flesh before surgery. Then gave him a few sips of wine and had at him.
Gruesome and horrifying and very educational. This book makes you thankful you live in the era of anesthesia!
He was a dude. And this book is an utterably readable, interesting, and horrifying account of some of the major medical developments and political struggles in Philadelphia at the time right before the Civil War.
So Dr. Mutter is that dude who collected grotesque human abnormalities, stuck them in pickling jars or made plaster casts, and then used them as props in his medical classes at Jefferson Medical College. After he died, he donated the whole shebang and it became this very gruesome but cool museum my father took me to in elementary school.
So when I saw this book, I was all over it. My usual caveats: I am a lit major and I tend to like science stories that filter the science through human relationships.
This book does that admirably. We get Mutter's early life and struggle as a dandified perfectionist newcomer in the old boys society of Philadelphia medicine. We get his professional struggles with colleagues over the then-controversial topics of whether surgeons can spread communicable disease (should they wash their hands? No? They can just wear the same blood-spattered jacket for every patient that day?) and whether surgery should be done with anesthesia (need an extra three guys to hold down the leg amputation patient so he won't thrash around? But using anesthesia means the surgeon can't gauge their surgery by the screams and moans).
Dr. Mutter comes off as a crazy-ambidextrously skilled surgeon with more than the usual concern with pre- and after- care for his patients. He was forward-thinking, and entirely devoted to his profession in this book. I couldn't help feeling sympathetic and grateful as the book describes one time he had to perform a cleft palate/lip surgery and spent hours beforehand massaging the poor man's face to help prepare and familiarize the patient's flesh before surgery. Then gave him a few sips of wine and had at him.
Gruesome and horrifying and very educational. This book makes you thankful you live in the era of anesthesia!