SC - Re: SC: Use of Medicinal Leeches

[Siegfried Heydrich]

    The nice thing about maggots is that they will only eat necrotic tissue,
and their excreta contains formaldehyde, which acts as an antiseptic.
They're being used in burn cases because unlike debriding, they're
relatively painless (although I suspect they itch like hell), they ONLY take
dead tissue away (debriding takes away more new-growth tissue than dead
tissue), and the doctors don't have to worry about funky drug interactions
when trying to control infections.

    Sieggy

- ----- Original Message ----- >
<< I wonder how good they are at reducing infections?  Like, sucking out
> infected
> goo with the blood around a sutured wound in a pre-antibiotic era >>
>
> No, actually, maggots were used for such things. The Leeches were good
for
> removing the "evil spirits and allowing the blood to flow" into the
affected
> area, but maggots were used to remove the dead tissue and infected masses.
> This per a book I own called Crime and Punishment, The Medical History of
> Torture. I don't even remember where I got it originally, I think a gift
> (don't ask about my friends, they're scary). Years ago, about 1960, my mom
> had very badly ulcerated legs due to a blood disorder. The doctors at
> Letterman General Hospital got special permission to try various methods
of
> treatment and leave one ucler as control (the disease she had is very,
very
> rare). So, being the military smart fool the doctor was, he used various
> creams, oxygen blasts, ointments, and in one case sterile maggots born in
the
> lab. Three days later they removed the maggots and had a spotlessly clean
> wound which they then used ointments on and covered.It never became
infected
> and it healed two weeks faster than any of the others. No significant
> scarring. However,  when the doc wrote up his findings he was told by the
> hospital board that he was derranged to have wanted to try it, that it
> sounded torturous, and that such practices "went out in the middle ages".
> Basically, he was censured for using the technique. Consequently, I don't
> believe it was ever attempted again at that hospital. But I do know that
> years later I read where a baby was badly burned and the maggots were used
to
> control the infections that happen with severe burn cases. It was during
this
> time I got the book from my friends. In it, it says that the maggots were
> never used as torture, but actually by the medical staff that was called
in
> to keep the patient alive and "vigorous of health and free of disease" to
> "endure continued questioning". I imagine in some cases that such
"treatment"
> prolonged the torture, but I also imagine that in some cases it might have
> assisted in surviving the torture by some.
>
> FYI.