surg

"it's not a bug, its a feature"

Anesthesia for surgery wasn’t recorded as discovered until late 1846. Anesthesia is still potentially deadly, licensed and well studied professionals in its use will prefer to not employ it where not necessary- but in those early days it was even less understood and the options available often had serious issues compared to modern anesthetics.

Tl:dr and conclusion- up to, and depending on circumstances- for a while after, 1847- if you needed a surgical procedure done- the doctor was going right in, with you awake and perhaps at best high or drunk if the procedure permitted. For that reason, but also because in general operations- like amputations- often had VERY high mortality rates- “surgeons” of the time were generally taught to just make it FAST. a “good” surgeon was the one that would remove your leg or arm the fastest- less time spent feeling your limbs being hacked off. And well- proceed below for bonus facts...

BONUS FACTS- Hand washing and sterilization of tools wasn’t common or medically recognized until around the same time- the late 1840’s. Doctors had been long resistant to the idea that they, learned and orderly upstanding men, could be filthier than a patients wound. So after having your legs hacked off by a guy using a dirty saw that he may have used on others or even animals the same day, and with the discovery of antibiotics in western medicine not coming until the 1920’s- most surgeons had pretty abysmal rates. So given the choice- many people chose death or continued suffering over surgery, and those who chose surgery, when they had a choice; chose a doctor who was fast since a slow doctor would have about the same odds of killing them as a fast one, but the fast one would at least get it over quicker.

Certain poultices and such had existed in places like China and Africa for thousands of years that had antibiotic properties, but it’s believed the mechanism wasn’t understood by them and western medicine didn’t recognize it until much later. Given how we look back at “surgeons” of the 1800’s and earlier- imagine how in 200 or so years they will view our practices of medicine and how “backwards” or incompetent we will seem?