Sinclair, Sir William J.: Semmelweis. His Life and his Doctrine (Manchester, 1909)
VII. Last Illness and Death
28o CARL BRAUN cold and clear and copious, evidently direct from the Schneeberg, without sophistication by heat or chemical substances. After this hurried and perfunctory hand-washing, the members of the class rushed off after the assistant up to the Hof where the Gebärhaus was situated. Arrived at the entrance of the labour room, each man in succession dipped his hands or fingers into a weak solution of permanganate of potash, contained in a vessel placed in a sort of vestibule. The vessel was never moved from its place, and the fluid contained in it, which looked like claret and water, served for all comers. Of real washing and disinfection of the hands there was not even a pretence. Such was the “systematic and diligent” use of chemical disinfectants which had been proclaimed as a failure in 1864; while heating and ventilation of the wards, not without plenty of wTarm dry diapers, gave satisfactory results. The members of the class of operators on the cadaver were offered opportunities of giving manual aid to the assistant fresh from the dead-house in the basement. The Scottish member of the class never once made an examination under those circumstances. He had become accustomed to genuine antiseptic methods, as recently applied by Lister to surgery, with the thorough washing of the hands followed by the use of carbolic acid solution with much care and circumstance, and he found the “ systematisch und fleissig ” prophylaxis of the First Obstetric Clinic of Vienna under the directorship of the Freiherr von Fernwald simply revolting. Is it not reasonable to suppose that the alleged failure of the Semmelweis method of prophylaxis at other lying- in hospitals as well was due to the same cause ? The Directors were epidemicists, scoffers openly at the “doctrine,” impervious to new knowledge, not severe towards breaches of the rules concerning disinfection by students and attendants. Such men were, for example, Scanzoni at Prague and Hecker at Munich. On the other hand, we see illustrated at the Vienna School for
