Semmelweis Childbed Fever

Mr. Gawande starts his literature on washing hands. He introduces two friends a microbiologist and an infectious disease specialist. Both work hard and diligently against the spread of diseases just like Semmelweis who is mentioned in the chapter. Something I learned, that not many realize, is that each year two million people acquire an infection while they are in the hospital. Mainly because the clinicians only wash their hands one-third to one-half as many times as they should. Semmelweis, mentioned earlier, concluded in 1847 that doctors themselves were to blame for childbed fever, which was the leading cause of

Semmelweis could be looked at as his own worst enemy in this situation, though. Although his theory behind all these unfortunate deaths was in fact true he often exercised eccentric and odd behavior discrediting himself and all the work he put into solving the mystery behind childbed fever. He was eventually committed to a public mental institution and died shortly after. Semmelweis’s autopsy was performed and ironically the same puss filled pockets that were found in the victims of childbed fever were discovered in his chest cavity as well. There were several reasons speculated to have caused his death, Nuland argues that it was possibly early onset Alzheimer’s. Bruises and severe injuries were also found to be covered all over Semmelweis’s body during the autopsy suggesting that his death could have been a result of the treatment that he received in the mental

The paper introduces a sophisticated analysis of the maternity-related issues as well as childbearing policies in the USA. The American documentary “Born in the USA” serves as a material for the study. It is the first public television documentary to provide an in-depth look at childbirth in America. It offers a fascinating overview of birthing, beginning with the early days of our country when almost everyone knew of mothers or babies who died in childbirth. As medicine advanced, maternal and infant mortality rates dropped radically. Hospitals were soon promoted as the safe, modern way to have a baby. The film reveals some crucial specifications of pregnancy, giving birth to a child and raising an offspring in the United States. Specifically, it verifies a general assumption, according to which American obstetricians possess a worldwide recognition, due to their proficiency (Wagner, 2008, p. 4). Moreover, the paper reviews such issues as pregnancy

It is clear by reviewing the article that the author is very much concerned with the well-being of women at this particular time. She mentions that some “doctors showed themselves more interested in protecting themselves than in caring for their patient.” McLaren also goes into detail with examples to show how the doctors would threaten their patients. Like for instance, Stewart Murrow threatened his dying patient Jennie Young that he would not treat her for septic poisoning if she didn’t name the person who performed the operation. Another case is the Sarah Robins affair where she was stimulated with drugs so as to declare the person who performed the operation. Some doctors saw themselves as the authorities. If a woman were dying in a hospital as the result of a bungled abortion, a statement was taken if only to protect the doctor and the hospital staff. This is why McLaren feels it wasn’t fair for women that doctors were too concerned for their reputation rather than the women who needed their help. McLaren also argues that methods of contraception were very expensive, for example the condom.

Sissy made the decision to deliver her eleventh child in a hospital. This decision saved her baby because the doctor gave Stephen Aaron oxygen to revive him. The reason Sissy decided to deliver in a hospital was because she would be examined by expert medical attention for the sake of her child. Doctors have medical degrees and will know the proper medical procedures in a time of crisis. Sissy would have heard that doctors prescribed pain relief during a delivery. “Doctors could only administer it because it contained dangerous substances ether and chloroform” (Manning 10). Hospitals also carried anesthetics such as epidurals. Epidurals made it easier during childbirth because it had a “safer approach and the mother could witness her child being born” (Lace 65). Episiotomies, a tool for making incisions, and forceps, a tool for holding the baby’s head during childbirth, were also invented to make birth more efficient. Sissy and other women chose hospitals because it put them in safer position because of medical

In a controlled experiment he found that having obstetricians wash their hands in a chlorinated-lime solution dropped maternal mortality from 10% to below 1%. He, too, was derided by the medical establishment and, for him personally, the result was tragic. Semmelweis lost his hospital position, was forced to move from Vienna to Budapest and when he wrote angry letters accusing European obstetricians of being irresponsible murderers, he was said to be insane (even his wife agreed.) No doubt he was unbalanced to a degree and in 1865 the forty-seven year old physician was forcibly committed to an asylum. He died there two weeks later, possibly as a result of injuries sustained when beaten by guards, and it wasn’t for nearly another three decades as a result of Pasteur’s work that Ignatz Semmelweis’s findings gained acceptance. In our time, reference sometimes is made to a so-called “Semmelweis Reflex” or “Semmelweiss Effect” which refers to a tendency to automatically reject new knowledge that contradicts established beliefs – in effect, “zombie

Robin Yates’s paper, “Pregnancy and Childbirth, The 1800’s vs. Now: What to Expect When You’re Not Expecting,” was filled with many clear points on the advancement of labor and medicine since the 1800s. This essay was filled with interesting and grabbing facts; however, the structure of the essay needs more support.

She believed that men were at fault for her stillborn children and continued to use the same birthing techniques (Smith 65). For her eleventh pregnancy, she went to a hospital and had a doctor deliver the baby, and for the first time the child lived (Smith 438). Sissy’s abundance of stillbirths may be due to the fact that, “Women who’ve already had one stillbirth have a four times higher risk of having another stillbirth compared to women who’ve had a live birth” (Reinberg par 1). Along with stillbirths, there were also high numbers of infant mortalities in the early 1900s (Louis par 6). Doctors did not know the causes of stillbirths and instead focused on preventing infant mortality (Louis par 6). Due to the lack of knowledge concerning stillbirths, they were a common occurrence (Louis par 7). In 1909, about one hundred seven out every one thousand children died (Pryce par 1). Researchers now know that the leading causes of stillbirths and infant mortality and the turn of the twentieth century were poor environment, diet, and hygiene due to poverty (Pryce par 2). Sissy’s poverty and previous stillbirths provide evidence that Betty Smith accurately described infant mortality and stillbirth in the early twentieth century in A Tree Grows in

Based on the late 19th century short stories, The Yellow Wallpaper and The Awakening, the authors depicted childbirth as a traumatic and even torturous experience, which left women to cope with the physical and mental health effects alone. Effects such as these impeded the mothers’ abilities to be the ideal ‘mother-woman’ to their offspring because in the eyes of patriarchal society, they were only existent in the domestic sphere and their feelings and emotions were null and void thus defining them as too weak to take on the strenuous demands of society. The expectations were that they exert minimal energy using intellect and instead maintain a household suitable for the husband and children.

Numerous individuals, incorporating some who work in the field of post-premature birth recuperating, are hesitant to concede that men can be considered casualties of fetus removal, yet Arthur Shostak, a Professor of Sociology at Drexel University, says that one of the biggest stuns that sexually dynamic young fellows experience is the stun that originates from listening to their sex accomplice say: "The test is back and we're pregnant and I'm going to have a premature

One of the Doctor’s Plague’s themes is ineffective communication. Nuland does well in connecting this theme across the book when he talks about Holmes and Gordon, both early proponents of sanitary methods for delivering babies, but whose ideas never gained mainstream acceptance. Semmelweis, of course, published his evidence for effective prevention of puerperal fever 10 years too late and in an almost unreadable state. Nuland then compares Louis Pasteur and his success gaining the acceptance of the scientific community with Semmelweis’ constant battle to even convince the people he worked with of the Lehre’s validity. The contrast of Pasteur and Semmelweis is stark, something which Nuland uses to effectively drive his communication theme home.

For hundred of years, women have wrestled with their womanhood, bodies, and what it means to be a woman in our society. Being a woman comes with a wonderful and empowering responsibility--giving birth. What sets us aside from other countries is that the process and expectations of giving birth has changed in our society; coming from midwifery, as it has always been since the early times, to hospitals where it is now expected to give birth at. Midwifery was a common practice in delivering babies in

Bernice L. Hausman is the author of this work and is a professor at Virginia Tech. She teaches courses in medical humanities, medical rhetoric, theories of the body, feminist and literary theory, and women’s literature. The source comes from Hypatia, a journal of feminist philosophy. This is trustworthy because it has been published since the 1980s and is based out of Villanova University. The main argument of this article is the effect the environment has on a maternal body, breast feeding, and HIV transmission. Environmental, economic, social and cultural forces present the state of a woman’s body. A feminist perspective is shown to help understand the disease ramification in relation to gender differences and women’s social and political position. This source is convincing and current. It was published within 10 years

Motherhood was an expected part of the wife’s life. Woman would have a large number of babies right after each other although some babies would not survive. “High mortality rates must have overshadowed the experience of motherhood in ways difficult to

Semmelweis worked in two hospitals and oversaw the delivery of babies. The first was run by medical students and physicians, and the second by midwives. He observed that the hospital run by medical students and physicians had a much higher rate of puerperal fever (which is a disease that causes the death of mothers after delivery) than the other hospital run by midwives. Through analysis of cases and a method of excluding other possible causes, he came up with a hypothesis that the higher rate of infections in women delivered by physicians and medical students was connected with their handling of corpses during autopsies before coming into contact with the pregnant women. This explained why the second hospital, in which