NATURAL ANESTHESIA
NATURE AFFORDS A UNIVERSAL MEANS OF
HEALING AND PRESERVING MEN.
Anton Mesmer
Decades before ether and chloroform began to be used for anesthesia, there was a safe and natural form of anesthesia. It was called mesmerism or animal magnetism and worked like magic. The
case of Madame Plantin was recounted by Dr. Elliotson
in The Zoist, v. IV
On the amputation of Madame Plantin’s breast. Under usual conditions in the time period, a mastectomy was a horrible procedure to undergo – as you might very well imagine. Thanks to magnetism, Plantin’s experience was entirely different. Madame Plantin, aged 64, living at No. 151, Rue Saint Denis, consulted M. Cloquet, April 8th, 1829, respecting an open cancer which had existed for several years in her breast, and which was complicated with a considerable enlargement of the right axillary ganglions. M. Chapelain, her physician, who had mesmerised her for some months, with the view of dissipating the disease, could effect only a profound sleep, in which sensation appeared suspended, but intellect remained perfect. He suggested to M. Cloquet [surgeon] to operate upon her in the mesmeric sleep-waking. M. Cloquet, having judged the operation indispensable, consented, and it was fixed for the following Sunday, April 1st. The previous two days, she was mesmerised several times by Dr. Chapelain, who prevailed upon her when in the state of sleep-waking to bear the operation without fear, and brought her even to converse about it calmly; although, when she was awake, she could not listen to the proposal for horror. On the day fixed, M. Cloquet arrived at half-past ten in the morning, and found the lady dressed in an arm-chair, in the attitude of a person calmly asleep. She had returned about an hour from mass, which she habitually attended at that time of the day. Dr. Chapelain had thrown her into the mesmeric sleep on her return. She spoke with perfect calmness of the operation which she was about to undergo. All being ready she undressed herself, and sat upon a common chair. Dr. Chapelain supported her right arm. The left was allowed to hang at her side. M. Pailloux, internal student of the Hospital Saint Louis, had the charge of presenting the instruments and applying the ligatures. The first incision was begun at the arm-pit, and carried above the breast as far as the inner side of the nipple. The second was begun at the same point, and carried under the breast till it met the first. M. Cloquet dissected out the enlarged ganglions with care, on account of their proximity to the axillary arteries, and removed the breast. The operation lasted ten or twelve minutes. During all this time, the patient conversed calmly with the operator, and gave not the least sign of sensibility; no movement occurred in the limbs or FEATURES, no change in the RESPIRATION or VOICE, no emotion EVEN IN THE PULSE, was discernible; this patient remained uninterruptedly in the same state of automatic indifference and passiveness, (état d’abandon et d’impassibilité automiques) or, as Mr. Topham says of his patient, ‘uncontrolled, in perfect stillness and repose,’ ‘like a statue!’ – in which she was some minutes before the operation. There was no necessity to restrain her, we had only to support her. A ligature was applied to the lateral thoracic artery, which was opened in removing the ganglions. The wound was closed with sticking plaster and dressed, and the patient was put to bed, still in the same state of sleepwaking; and was left in this state for eight and forty hours. An hour after the operation a slight haemorrhage occurred, which proved of no importance. The first dressing was removed on Tuesday the 14th; the wound was washed and dressed afresh; the patient shewed no sign of pain; the pulse was undisturbed. After this dressing, Dr. Chapelain awoke the patient whose sleep-waking had lasted from one hour before the operation, i. e. two days. The lady seemed to have no idea, no conception, of what had passed; but, on learning that she had been operated upon, and seeing her children around her, she experienced a very strong emotion, to which the mesmeriser put an end by immediately sending her to sleep again. Painless removal of a Breast in America From The Zoist v 12 The patient was Mrs. Clark, wife of Mr. Jesse Clark, of Columbia County, Georgia; the operator, Dr. L. A. Ducas, Professor of Physiology in the Medical College of Georgia, who detailed it in the Southern Medical and Surgical Journal, published in Augusta City. Several eminent physicians were present. On consulting Dr. Ducas, she mentioned that, “She had been advised by Mr. Kenrick to be mesmerised; but as she knew nothing about it, she would ask my advice, and would abide by it. To which I replied that there were several well-authenticated cases on record, in which surgical operations had been performed, under mesmeric influence, without the consciousness of the patient; that I would be happy to test the subject in her case; and that I would endeavour to mesmerise her, instead of operating as had been proposed, on the day following.” Mesmerism was accordingly performed by Mr. Kenrick on the 4th of January, and she went to sleep and became insensible to pain. The process was repeated daily. “On the 9th January, I invited Professor Ford to be present, and after pricking and pinching strongly the patient without evidence of pain, the mesmeriser was requested to leave the room, when we exposed the breast, handled it roughly in examining the tumor, and readjusted the dress, without the consciousness of the patient. We then held to her nostrils a vial of strong spirits of hartshorn, which she breathed freely for a minute or two, without the least indication of sensation, unless the fact that she swallowed once be regarded as such, instead of a mere reflex action. On the 11th of January, in the presence of Professors Ford and Mead, in addition to the usual tests, I made with my pocket knife an incision about two inches in length, and half an inch in depth, into the patient’s leg, without indication of sensation. “Fully satisfied now of our power to induce total insensibility, I determined to operate upon her the next day at noon, but carefully concealed any such design from the patient and her friends, who did not expect its performance until several days later. “On the 20th January, at twenty minutes past 11 a.m., Mrs. Clark was put to sleep in forty-five seconds, without touch or pass of any kind, the facility with which the mesmeric influence was produced having gradually increased at each sitting. At 12 o’clock, in the presence of Professors Ford, Mead, Garvin, and Newton, and Dr. Halsee, the patient being in a profound sleep, I prepared her dress for the operation, and requested my professional brothers to note her pulse, respiration, complexion, countenance, &c., before, during, and after the amputation in order to detect any evidence of pain, or modification of the functions. As Mr. Kenrick had never witnessed a surgical operation, he feared he might lose his self-possession, and requested to be blindfolded, which was done. He now seated himself on the couch near the patient, and held her hand in his during the operation. “This was accomplished by two elliptical incisions about eight inches in length, comprehending between them the nipple and a considerable portion of the skin; after which the integuments were dissected up in the usual manner, and the entire mamma removed. It weighed sixteen ounces. The wound was then left open about three quarters of an hour, in order to secure the bleeding vessels, six of which were ligated. The ordinary dressing was applied, and all appearances of blood carefully removed, so that they might not be seen by the patient when aroused. The amount of haemorrhage was rather more than is usual in such cases. “During the operation the patient gave no indication whatever of sensibility, nor was any of the functions observed by those present modified in the least degree. She remained in the same sound and quiet sleep as before the use of the knife. Subsequently the pectoral muscle, which had been laid bare, was twice or thrice seen to contract when touched with the sponge in removing the blood. About 15 minutes after the operation, a tremulous action was perceived in the lower jaw, which was instantaneously arrested by the application of the mesmeriser’s hand to the patient’s head. This phenomenon recurred in about ten minutes after, and was again in the same manner required. Professor Ford, who counted the pulse and respiration, states that before any preparation was made for the operation, the pulse was 96, and the respiration 16 per minute; that after removing the patient to arrange her dress for the operation, and just before this was commenced, the pulse was 98, and the respiration 17; that immediately after the detachment of the breast, the pulse was 96 – respiration not counted; and that after the final adjustment of the bandages and dress, which required the patient to rise and move about, the pulse was 98 and the respiration 16. All present concur in stating that neither the placid countenance of the patient, nor the peculiar natural blush of the cheeks, experienced any change whatever during the whole process; that she continued in the same profound and quiet sleep, in which she was before noted, and that, had they not been aware of what was being done, they would not have suspected it from any indications furnished by the patient’s condition. “The patient having been permitted to sleep on about half an hour after the final arrangement of her dress, the mesmeriser made passes over the seat of the operation in order to lessen its sensibility, and aroused her in the usual manner, when she engaged in cheerful conversation with Mr. Kenrick and myself, as though she had no suspicion of what had taken place. I then introduced to her the gentlemen, who had placed themselves so as not to be seen by her on awakening, and observed that I had invited them to come in during her sleep, in order that we might fully test her insensibility preparatory to the operation. After a few minutes of conversation, I asked her when she would like to have the operation performed? To which she replied, ‘The sooner the better,’ as she was anxious to get home. I added, ‘Do you really think that I could remove your entire breast when asleep without your knowledge?’ Answer – ‘Why, doctor, the fact is, that from the various experiments I am told you have made on me, I really do not know what to think of it.’ ‘Well, madam, suppose I were to perform the operation one of these days, and to inform you of it when you would awake, would you believe me, and could you control your feelings on finding that it had been done?’ Answer – ‘I could not suppose that you would deceive me, and of course I would be very glad, but would try not to give way to my feelings.’ ‘Have you perceived since your arrival here, or do you now perceive, any change in the ordinary sensations of the affected breast?’ ‘No, sir, it feels about as it has done for some time back.’ “About a quarter of an hour having elapsed since she awoke, I then told her that as we found her in a proper state for the operation, I had performed it, and that the breast was now removed. She expressed her incredulity – said I was certainly jesting, as it was impossible that it could have been without her knowing it at the time, or feeling anything of it now. She became convinced only on carrying her hand to the part and finding that the breast was no longer there. She remained apparently unmoved for a few moments, when, her friends approaching to congratulate her, her face became flushed, and she wept unaffectedly for some time. The wound healed by the first intention. “In laying the above narrative before the profession, it is due to the cause of truth to state, that it has been submitted to all the physicians at the operation, and that I am authorized by them to say that it accords in every particular with their own observations so far as they were present. I should also add, that having no other object in view than the establishment of the fact that a surgical operation may be performed under such circumstances without the consciousness of the patient, I have designedly avoided any mention of the various and interesting mesmeric phenomena manifested prior and subsequently to the operation. These have been carefully and judiciously recorded by Mr. Kenrick, whose well-directed zeal has enabled him to collect a body of highly important facts from a field unfortunately explored too exclusively in ignorance and charlatanism. “Dr. L. A. Ducas, Augusta, Ga., lst Feb., 1845.” From Numerous Cases of Surgical Operations Without Pain in the Mesmeric State by John Elliotson Account of a Case of Successful Amputation of the Thigh, During the Mesmeric State, Without the Knowledge of the Patient, in the district hospital of Wellow, Nottinghamshire. Nov 22, 1843. The mesmerizer was W. Topham, Esq., barrister, of the Middle Temple: the operator, W. Squire Ward, Esq., surgeon, of Wellow Hall. The patient was a laborer, six feet high and forty-two years of age, named James Wombell. He had suffered for nearly five years from neglected disease of the left knee, the interior of the joint of which was found after the amputation deeply and extensively ulcerated. “The slightest motion of the joint was attended by the most excruciating agony; his nights were almost wholly sleepless in consequence of the painful startings of the limb; his pulse weak and rapid; his face constantly marked with a hectic flush; his tongue foul; appetite gone.” In truth, when Mr. Topham first saw him, on September 9, “He was sitting upright upon a bed in the hospital — the only position which he could bear — he complained of great pain from his knee and of much excitability and loss of strength from his constant restlessness and deprivation of sleep, for he had not, during the three previous weeks, slept more than two hours in seventy.” On this day he was first mesmerized by Mr. Topham, and for thirty-five minutes. “The only effect produced was a closing of the eyelids, with that quivering appearance that so commonly results from the process, and though awake and speaking, he could not raise them until after a lapse of a minute and a half.” On the tenth he was sent to sleep in twenty minutes. On the eleventh, “He was suffering great agony, and distressed even to tears.” Mr. Topham “commenced by making passes longitudinally over the diseased knee; in five minutes he was comparatively easy, and on proceeding further to mesmerize him, at the expiration of ten minutes more he was sleeping like an infant. Not only his arms were then violently pinched but also the diseased leg itself, without his exhibiting any sensation: yet his limb was so sensitive to pain in his natural state, he could not bear even the lightest covering to rest upon it. That night he slept seven hours without interruption.” “On September 22, the patient was first apprised of the necessity of an early amputation. The communication seemed almost unexpected, and affected him considerably, and destroyed his natural sleep that night.” The next day he was still “fretting, restless, and in consequent pain.” Yet he was put to sleep mesmerically in four and a half minutes. Although in this mesmeric coma the sensibility to mechanical causes of pain was so far lessened that violent pinching and sudden pricking, of even the diseased limb, produced no evidence of sensation, and he lost all pain in his knee while this was in perfect rest, the exquisitely sensitive interior of the diseased joint was not proof against the torture of motion, which, however slight, agonized and awoke him. At the time of the operation, October 1, it was found impossible, without such torture as aroused him from his mesmeric coma, to remove him from his bed to the table. Indeed, his coma was not so deep but that it was dissipated by attempting to converse with him, and in general it ceased spontaneously in half an hour, his waking being “slow and gradual and without the least start.” Instead of being placed upon a table, he was therefore lifted with his low bed upon a temporary platform, and “he was soon put into the mesmeric sleep, although he was considerably excited by hearing the cries of another patient upon whom Mr. Ward had been performing a tedious and painful operation.” He was then “drawn by means of the bedclothes beneath him toward the end of the bed.” Even this movement excited the pain and awoke him. But the pain soon ceased, and his limb being “raised about two inches from the mattress” by a surgeon present (Mr. Wood), who “rested the heel upon his shoulder and supported the joint with his hand,” he was mesmerized into coma again in four minutes. Mr. Topham continued to mesmerize him for fifteen minutes and then informed Mr. Ward that the operation might be begun, and “brought two fingers of each hand gently in contact with the patient’s closed eyelids; and there kept them, still further to deepen the sleep.” This is a circumstance of no little importance to remember. Of all parts of the body, the eyes are the most ready receivers and transmitters of mesmerism. The operation was now commenced. “Mr. Ward, after one earnest look at the man,” in the words of Mr. Topham, “slowly plunged his knife into the center of the outside of the thigh, directly to the bone, and then made a clear incision round the bone, to the opposite point on the inside of the thigh. The stillness at this moment was something awful; the calm respiration of the sleeping man alone was heard, for all other seemed suspended. In making the second incision, the position of the leg was found more inconvenient than it appeared to be,” and Mr. Ward, to use his own words, “having made the anterior flap…was under the necessity of completing the posterior one in three stages. First, by dividing a portion of the flap on the inside; then a similar portion on the outside. This proceeding, which was of course far more tedious and painful than the ordinary one, was necessary to enable me to pass the knife through under the bone and thus complete the whole, as I could not sufficiently depress the handle to do so, without the two lateral cuts.” Yet, notwithstanding all this, the patient’s “sleep continued as profound as ever. The placid look of his countenance never changed for an instant; his whole frame rested, uncontrolled, in perfect stillness and repose; not a muscle was seen to twitch.To the end of the operation, including the sawing of the bone, securing the arteries, and applying the bandages, occupying a period of upward of twenty minutes, he lay like a statue.” Soon after the second incision, “a low moaning” was heard at intervals until the conclusion of the operation, that is, after the leg was off and while the arteries were tying and the bandages putting on, giving “to all present the impression of a disturbed dream.” That it arose from troubled dreaming I have no doubt, for in the mesmeric coma it is common for patients, after the lapse of a certain time, to dream and talk, and especially of anything which has just before strongly impressed them. Had it arisen from the operation, it would have occurred during the most painful periods — would have occurred, as it did not, exactly and only at moments of the proceeding most likely to be painful, whereas it occurred as much at moments when nothing was doing to give pain. The man could not have moaned from pain in spite of himself at moments when there was nothing to make him moan in spite of himself. It would have been increased, and indeed changed to a sudden and louder noise, whenever the end of the sciatic nerve was roughly treated. For, still further to test his insensibility, Mr. Ward “twice touched” and, as he informs me, pretty roughly and with the points of the forceps, so that he in fact pricked “the divided end of the sciatic nerve without any increase of the low moaning.” Mr. Ward further informs me that he “once put his thumb roughly upon the nerve in taking the posterior flap in his hand to sponge, and also used the sponge very roughly.” The mesmeric state of the patient usually lasted half an hour, and after this lapse of time, he “gradually and calmly,” as usual, awoke. “At first,” said the surgeon, Mr. Wood, “he uttered no exclamation, and for some moments seemed lost and bewildered,” — a characteristic and striking phenomenon so familiar to mesmerists when any visible change in external circumstances has occurred while the patient was asleep. But, after looking around, he exclaimed, “I bless the Lord to find it’s all over.” “He was then removed to another room, and following immediately,” Mr. Topham “asked him in the presence of all assembled to describe all he felt or knew after he was mesmerized. His reply was, ‘I never knew anything more and never felt any pain at all; I once felt as if I heard a kind of crunching.’” Mr. Topham asked if that were painful. He replied, “No pain at all.”  From Mesmerism
in India by James Esdaile, 1846.
James Esdaile was a Scotsman who served in the East India Company for 20 years. He became known as the “miracle man” while working as surgeon for the Hooghly prison hospital near Calcutta. He performed hundreds of operations with very low mortality using mesmerism – that even though he had never before seen mesmeric methods practiced nor read any books on the subject. The following are taken from one of his subsequent writings on the subject: There is good reason to believe that the vital fluid [force] of one person can be poured into the system of another, upon which it has various effects, according to constitutional peculiarities, the demand for it as a remedy, and the manner and extent to which it is exhibited in order to answer different purposes. Man is not as commonly supposed, shut up in that pent-house, his body, isolated, and impotent to affect his fellow-creatures beneficially by a benevolent will, and his own innate resources. A merciful God has ingrafted a communicable, life-giving, curative power in the human body, in order that when two individuals are found together, deprived of the aids of art, the one in health may often be able to soothe and relieve his sick companion, by imparting to him a portion of his vitality. To believe that we possess such a power is, surely, a proud and exalting idea, which I hope the public will entertain with pleasure; and intrust to be able to prove to the satisfaction of all dispassionate and reflecting minds, that this is no fond delusion of an excited brain, but a substantial blessing, daily at work for good, extending immeasurably man’s individual power of doing good by his unaided natural powers, and bringing healing and comfort to suffering humanity, all over the world…. That he possesses such appears to me to be extremely probable, from the analogies of the animal creation, and the universal benevolence of the Deity to his creatures. It must be most important and instructive to discover what were, or, if not yet known, what are, the natural remedies of man; for by observing their effects we shall best understand the restorative processes of Nature, and be able to imitate them by art, with a certainty hitherto unattained by medicine. [Illustrative Case] Teencowrie Paulit, a peasant, aged 40. Two years ago, he began to suffer from a tumour in the antrum maxillare [upper jaw]; the tumour has pushed upon the orbit of the eye, filled up the nose, passed into the throat, and caused an enlargement of the glands of the neck. I was very desirous to reduce him to a state of insensibility before operating on him, and for the last fortnight my assistants have all perseveringly tried it, but without inducing sleep even. Indeed, from the tumour obstructing his throat, he has hardly slept for five months. Having ascertained that he was easier when sitting, I took him in hand myself, to-day, and entranced him in a chair by the following process. The room being darkened, I suspended my spread hands over his head for some time, and then carried them slowly down, one in front, the other behind; the former dwelling over the eyes, nose, mouth, and sides of the neck, and the latter being applied over the base of the brain: both were then carried down the centre of the body, claw-like, to the pit of the stomach, where they were spread and gently pressed, one opposite the other; and I kept breathing on the head and eyes all the time. In half an hour, the man was catalepsed, and in a quarter more, I performed one of the most severe and protracted operations in surgery; the man - was totally unconscious. I put a long knife in at the corner of his mouth, and brought the point out over the cheek-bone, dividing the parts between; from this, I pushed it through the skin at the inner corner of the eye, and dissected the cheek back to the nose. The pressure of the tumour had caused the absorption of the anterior wall of the antrum, and on pressing my fingers between it and the bones, it burst, and a shocking gush of blood, and brain-like matter, followed. The tumour extended as far as my finger could reach under the orbit and cheek-bone, and passed into the gullet — having destroyed the bones and partition of the nose. No one touched the man, and I turned his head into any position I desired, without resistance, and there it remained till I wished to move it again : when the blood accumulated, I bent his head forward, and it ran from his mouth as if from a leaden spout. The man never moved, nor showed any signs of life, except an occasional indistinct moan; but when I threw back his head, and passed my fingers into his throat to detach the mass in that direction, the stream of blood was directed into his wind-pipe, and some instinctive effort became necessary for existence; he therefore coughed, and leaned forward, to get rid of the blood; and I supposed that he then awoke. The operation was by this time finished, and he was laid on the floor to have his face sewed up, and while this was doing, he for the first time opened his eyes. [Three days after surgery], This is even a more wonderful affair than I supposed yesterday. The man declares by the most emphatic pantomime, that he felt no pain while in the chair, and that when he awoke, I was engaged in sewing up his face, on the floor; so that the coughing and forward movement to get rid of the blood, were involuntary, instinctive efforts, to prevent suffocation.
Mesmerism is the “Medicine of Nature.”
~~~ A small number of Europeans who have come under my observation, the majority have also succumbed to the influence ; and if the proud sons of civilisation will condescend to return for a moment to the feet of their mother Nature, they also will probably benefit by her bounties. We have so far deserted Nature, that, in return, she has renounced us as unnatural children, and left us to our self-sufficiency and artificial resources; but these, in general, are mere make-shifts and palliatives, com- pared with the steady and enduring curative powers of nature, when properly understood and brought into action. The whole art of the true physician is exerted to induce nature to interfere and take up the case of his patient; and when he sees signs of her gracious presence, he only reverentially looks on, and confines himself to removing impediments in her way. But the routine practitioner will rarely condescend to divide with nature the merit of the cure. He and his pills, powders, and potions, must have all the credit; and if any one pretends to be able sometimes to cure disease by the unassisted powers of nature, he is called quack, impostor, or fool, and hunted down as a fera naturae. But, in my estimation, the genuine medical quack is he who, professing to cure disease, yet allows his patients to suffer and perish, by ignorantly, or presumptuously, despising any promising or possible means of relief. It must be most important and instructive to discover what were, or, if not yet known, what are, the natural remedies of man; for by observing their effects we shall best understand the restorative processes of Nature, and be able to imitate them by art, with a certainty hitherto unattained by medicine. So far from Mesmerism being a new and unnatural art, there is every reason to believe that it is the oldest and most natural mode of curing many of the severe, uncomplicated diseases of the human race. |
The Great Physician
Love Heals
“Even as there is only one nature, one life, one health,
there is, only one disease, one remedy, one healing.”
Mesmer
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