Licence: In copyright
Credit: Medico-legal / by E.S. McKee. 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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![[Reprinted from Monthly Cyclopaedia and Medical Bulletin, Nov., 1908.] IpEDICO- By McKEEj M.B. V / a ~ ™ * ft. ' Sued for Saving Her Life. Vienna was recently the scene of a suit of this character. A woman suf- fering from tuberculous disease of the vertebral column charged a surgeon and his assistant with having caused the disease by means of manipulations suc- cessfully instituted to bring her back to life, in collapse, under an anaes- thetic. During the operation a gynecological one, the respiration ceased and recourse was had to Sylvester’s method, and after a while respiration was re- stored. She was able to leave the hospital in four days. Noticing a few weeks later that there was something wrong with her spine, she accused the surgeons with having injured it. It was proven by the clinical history of the woman taken before operation, that she had already been under hospital treatment for tuberculosis of several organs, including bones, for some years. The vertebral trouble could, luckily for the defendants, be diagnosed as tubercular without any trouble. The judge not only dismissed the case, but added that he had hardly ever known a charge so unjustly made. The woman, he added, should be grateful to the doctors for having saved her life, even had they really done her some harm, which he was glad to say was not the case. Infanticide—Suggested Alterations in Laws for its Punishment. Mr. F. G-. Frayling read a paper before the London Medico-Legal Society in which he said that, owing to the fact that it was so difficult to prove the child’s separate existence in law, and to the ordeal of the mother being com- mitted to trial on a capital charge, the crime should no longer be regarded as ordinary murder, from which it differed in several particulars, a distinct offense should be created or it should be regarded as a misdemeanor or felony. The chairman felt that juries often realized that they were not dealing with the person most concerned; further, the death sentence was not deterrent in these cases, as it was never carried out. Dr. Charles Mercier thought that the per- sonal appearance of the girl lead juries to exhibit a leniency to which they had no claim. He doubted if such women were so sensitive as sometimes alleged. The sanctity of human life must be regarded and the death penalty retained as real deterrent. Dr. W. H. Willcox regretted the present attitude of the law which led to almost farcical proceedings in these cases. Mr. John Trout-](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22417631_0003.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
