5fish
Captain
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2007
- Location
- Central Florida
Yes, plastic surgery was invented during the American Civil War...
Before the U. S. Civil War, reconstructive plastic surgery, especially of the face, didn't really exist — it had been theorized in the medical journal known asThe Lancet in 1837, and before that, facial reconstruction was limited totaking skin flaps and bone from other parts of the body to form facial features. But with over 10,000 cases of gunshot and cannon shrapnel wounds to the faces of various soldiers during the war, the need for something to at least partially reconstruct facial features was pretty dire. That put it high on the priority list.
Of course, with it being more or less experimental in nature and very much in need of research and testing, it couldn't be deployed for very many of those 10,000; indeed, it was successfully performed on only about 30 former soldiers or officers.
Here is a link to stories about some of those men...
http://www.civilwarmed.org/facial-reconstruction/
Snippet...
“Plastic Surgery:” Today the phrase may bring to mind thoughts of people voluntarily undergoing operations attempting to look eternally young or more attractive. But for wounded soldiers, beginning during the Civil War and continuing through today, plastic surgery has a far deeper resonance.
“Plastic” before the introduction of organic polymers, often referred to an object that could be shaped or sculpted – in this case, a patient’s skin and soft tissue. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term was first used in The Lancet in December of 1837. Army Medical Museum curator George Otis reported only 32 cases of ‘Plastic Operations’ in the first surgical volume of the Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion (MSHWR) in 1870. Of these, “twenty-nine were for deformities following gunshot injuries” while noting there were “nearly ten thousand in number” cases of gunshot injuries of the face during the war. (MSHWR Surg I, p. 379)
Snippet...
An example of basic surgical care can be seen in Surgical Photograph 32, “Shell wound of the face.” Pvt. William H. Nims, Co. D, 61st New York Volunteers, was wounded on June 17, 1864, at the Battle of Petersburg, Va. Surgeon Thomas Crosby removed bone splinters and stitched his wound together with no attempts at reconstruction. Nims survived, but “In 1867, Pension Examiner G.W. Avery, reported that this pensioner continued to suffer greatly, and that the very unpleasant deformity induced by his wound, made it impracticable for him to obtain employment. Thus his mutilation was a doubly cruel one.” (MSHWR Surg 1, p. 329-330)
Well, there are several other stories and pictures of these soldiers who were some of the first to get plastic surgery...
Before the U. S. Civil War, reconstructive plastic surgery, especially of the face, didn't really exist — it had been theorized in the medical journal known asThe Lancet in 1837, and before that, facial reconstruction was limited totaking skin flaps and bone from other parts of the body to form facial features. But with over 10,000 cases of gunshot and cannon shrapnel wounds to the faces of various soldiers during the war, the need for something to at least partially reconstruct facial features was pretty dire. That put it high on the priority list.
Of course, with it being more or less experimental in nature and very much in need of research and testing, it couldn't be deployed for very many of those 10,000; indeed, it was successfully performed on only about 30 former soldiers or officers.
Here is a link to stories about some of those men...
http://www.civilwarmed.org/facial-reconstruction/
Snippet...
“Plastic Surgery:” Today the phrase may bring to mind thoughts of people voluntarily undergoing operations attempting to look eternally young or more attractive. But for wounded soldiers, beginning during the Civil War and continuing through today, plastic surgery has a far deeper resonance.
“Plastic” before the introduction of organic polymers, often referred to an object that could be shaped or sculpted – in this case, a patient’s skin and soft tissue. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term was first used in The Lancet in December of 1837. Army Medical Museum curator George Otis reported only 32 cases of ‘Plastic Operations’ in the first surgical volume of the Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion (MSHWR) in 1870. Of these, “twenty-nine were for deformities following gunshot injuries” while noting there were “nearly ten thousand in number” cases of gunshot injuries of the face during the war. (MSHWR Surg I, p. 379)
Snippet...
An example of basic surgical care can be seen in Surgical Photograph 32, “Shell wound of the face.” Pvt. William H. Nims, Co. D, 61st New York Volunteers, was wounded on June 17, 1864, at the Battle of Petersburg, Va. Surgeon Thomas Crosby removed bone splinters and stitched his wound together with no attempts at reconstruction. Nims survived, but “In 1867, Pension Examiner G.W. Avery, reported that this pensioner continued to suffer greatly, and that the very unpleasant deformity induced by his wound, made it impracticable for him to obtain employment. Thus his mutilation was a doubly cruel one.” (MSHWR Surg 1, p. 329-330)
Well, there are several other stories and pictures of these soldiers who were some of the first to get plastic surgery...