Fulguration and thermo-radiotherapy / by William Seaman Bainbridge ; and, Diathermy (Nagelschmidt) and electro-coagulation (Doyen) / by Worthington Seaton Russell.

  • Bainbridge, William Seaman, 1870-1947.
Date:
1913
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Fulguration and thermo-radiotherapy / by William Seaman Bainbridge ; and, Diathermy (Nagelschmidt) and electro-coagulation (Doyen) / by Worthington Seaton Russell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    harmful unless the destruction is complete of both macroscopic and microscopic malignant tissue. Careful observations have led to the conclusion that cancer cells at a distance from the area cauterized may be stimulated by the action of the short spark. As Riviere himself has pointed out, this method cannot be employed for the destruction of large tumors. Oscillatory Desiccation (Clark). According to Clark,® heat effects range in degree from hyperemia to burning, and somewhere between these two extremes there is a point, the effect of which is more than hyperemia and less than burning, which may be called the desiccation point. His method of treating neoplasms consists in the production, the control and sustaining of heat sufficient to cause the rapid dehydrating of the part treated, sterilizing and con- verting it into an inert mass. This is accomplished by a specialized, true oscillatory high-frequency current, concentrated to a very fine metal point, and delivered in sparks of great frequency through an air space to the tissue. He employs a static machine with a large output (3 to 6 milliamperes). This method is often referred to as fulguration. Fulguration, “as practiced at home and abroad for several years,” according to Clark, “is not desiccation, the thermic degree being too high, and the impact against the tissue too severe.” He doubtless refers in this statement to the so-called “destructive fulguration.” Thermo-penetration (d’Arsonval). In 1896 d’Arsonval demonstrated the power of the high-frequency current to cause a decided rise of temperature in tissues interposed between two electrodes. This property of thermo-penetration has been variously utilized by different investigators. By some, notably de Keat- ing-Hart, it has been employed for the purpose of heating the tissues with a view to rendering them more radio-sensitive; by others (Nagel- schmidt and Doyen), it has been used as a means of destruction of neoplasms. Diathermy, or Transthermy (Nagelschmidt). In 1907 Nagelschmidt, in Berlin, von Brendt, Preeps, and Zeyneck, in Vienna, and de Kraft, in New York, experimented independently with the thermo-penetrative power of the high-frequency current. Since that time this method has been employed by surgeons in different centers, generally under the name diathermy, applied by Nagelschmidt. The apparatus employed permits the elevation of the temperature of the deep tissues to any required extent, the tumor being destroyed by the coagulation of the tissues. This is merely a thermic means of destruction, having no effect whatever upon the trophic centers. “Clark, William L. Oscillatory Desiccation m the Treatment of Accessible Malignant Growths and Minor Surgical Conditions: A New Electrical Effect Journal Advanced Therapeutics, 1911, xxii, i^. Also, A Preliminary Report Upon the Destruction of Surface and Cavity Neoplasms by Desiccation. New York Medical Journal, 19”. xciii, 1131-