Sinclair, Sir William J.: Semmelweis. His Life and his Doctrine (Manchester, 1909)
VII. Last Illness and Death
THORBURN 317 Thorburn. In the year 1875, when the attention of the medical profession of the United Kingdom was turned upon the discussion in the Obstetrical Society of London, many articles and papers on puerperal fever appeared in the medical journals, largely from members of the Society who were unable to take part in the discussion. Among such contributions was one “On Puerperal Pyaemia,”1 by Dr. Thorburn, Lecturer in Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Owens College School of Medicine, Manchester. We select this contribution as an illustration of what was then really taught concerning puerperal fever in England, and the author as the best type of enlightened provincial teacher of midwifery. Dr. Thorburn received his medical education at Edinburgh on a solid basis of mental ability and sound sense. His career as teacher was spent in the capacity of professor of midwifery in the most important provincial school of medicine in England. It began as Assistant to Simpson about 1856. He was probably the first in England to introduce Listerism into gynaecological surgery. He was incapable of modifying his professional judgments with a view to personal advantage or popularity, and he did not possess a trace of that worst of all faults in a teacher, an affectation of eccentric or exclusive opinions put on for the sake of notoriety and its reward. We are surely safe in selecting Dr. Thorburn as the type of provincial teacher of midwifery of his time. He was typical also in his disabilities : he had no means of giving clinical instruction. Let us look into the principles on which he founded his teaching on puerperal fever. Does he rise to the Hegar standard? He says : “ The puerperal woman is placed much in the same position as one who has undergone a serious surgical operation, involving raw absorbing surfaces. . . . She is specially liable to attacks of infectious disease in consequence of this wound and lowered vitality. . . . She is also most liable to every 1. Brit. Med. Journal, June 12, 1875.
