War Palace and Knee Pillow, Austria’s Destiny

October 15, 1842.

University of Vienna, Austria.

Lawford Williamson Lange is a little-known American doctor, and today he was invited to one of the highest universities in the world, the Austrian Imperial University of Vienna, to announce his research results.

In fact, Lawford had already performed such an operation as early as March 20, 1842. He used ether gas to successfully anesthetize a young man named James Webb and remove the mass.

But the achievements of Lawford Williamson Lange are not well known. In fact, in the following years, many doctors claimed that they invented ether anesthesia.

In particular, Dr. William Thomas Green Morton's successful performance at the MIT General Hospital allowed many people to see the effect of ether anesthesia and regard him as the first person to conduct inhalation anesthesia experiments.

Even Morton's epitaph reads: "Because of him, the pain of surgery can be prevented and eliminated. Before him, surgery was extremely painful; after him, science defeated pain."

But in fact, whether it was Morton or the previously mentioned Lange, these two people were obsessed with fighting for patent rights after they invented ether anesthesia, resulting in nothing being accomplished afterwards, which makes people sigh.

However, Franz was not interested in caring about who invented inhalation anesthesia. If he had liked, he could have done it himself a few years ago, but it was better to let professionals do such risky things.

Even today, when the technology is mature, anesthesia is still a technology that carries great risks.

Franz is concerned about how many civilians and injured soldiers can be saved in the future by the concept of sterility and anesthesia technology.

Lawford Williamson Lange's use of ether was completely accidental. When he was studying in school, he discovered that many participants at some parties inhaled laughing gas or ether for entertainment. They not only danced and looked funny, but also often fell down. Or feel no pain when touching something.

So he just used ether gas with the attitude of giving it a try. There was no scientific proof before, and he didn't even know what the dosage should be.

At this time, Lawford Williamson Lange accepted a $10,000 bonus from the University of Vienna. He had to bite the bullet and use his "little tricks" in front of countless experts and scholars.

For the sake of safety and success, Lawford Williamson Lange found a gout patient. Lawford promised the patient free gout relief and would pay him $500.

But the gout patient never dreamed that he would never be able to open his eyes again.

At first, Lawford Williamson Lange's American-style opening speech had the opposite effect. After all, the people who came to watch his demonstration took time out of their busy schedules to see scientific progress, not to listen to his vulgar talk. A joke.

(The old American opener is to start with a dirty joke and funny sarcasm.)

Lawford compared the gout patient's feet to a beautiful woman. According to him, as long as the tube is inserted into the patient's mouth, and after thirty seconds, you can do whatever you want.

However, the Austrian doctors and scholars present generally had poor English proficiency, and they watched the demonstration in a very formal manner, so they did not find it funny.

In fact, Franz also felt that Lawford's opening remarks were not very good. This metaphor was not funny at all. On the contrary, it was a bit disgusting.

Thalia and Adjani, who were watching the demonstration together, both looked at Franz with strange eyes. The former felt that there was obviously a mysterious powder brought back by Costa (some kind of resentful explorer) from the Amazon rainforest, so what else could he do with ether? what?

The latter felt that Franz must have some ulterior hobbies, so he needed the other party to lose consciousness. In short, both felt that Franz had evil intentions.

"Scientific progress! What do you know! Think about it when you extract teeth in the future, the doctor will use pliers to clamp your decayed tooth and spin it like a crocodile. Then you will know the greatness of this invention."

As soon as Franz finished speaking, Thalia and Adjani deliberately showed their white teeth.

According to Franz's opinion, people who often eat sweets should have poor teeth.

In fact, this idea is wrong. People who often eat sweets do not necessarily have poor teeth, but people who often eat low-quality food must have poor teeth.

During this period, it was not uncommon for poor people in their thirties to lose all their teeth, because the food they ate was too coarse and caused serious wear and tear on their teeth, and things such as toothpaste and tooth powder were not yet widely available.

At the beginning of the demonstration, Lawford Williamson Lange had the subject inhale a large amount of ether gas for thirty seconds to ensure that he would not wake up during the operation.

After confirming that the other party was unconscious, Dr. Lawford began his performance. He deliberately made the incision very large so that the doctors present could feel the pain of cutting through the flesh.

However, Dr. Lawford was not in a hurry to remove the tophi. Instead, he deliberately used a knife to cut and rummage around the patient's foot, and then sutured it.

Although Austrian doctors and scholars had previously been disdainful of the American, they now realized the magic of this new technology and began to watch the operation carefully.

In the end, a total of 12 large and small tophi were removed. The operation was very successful. Just as there was thunderous applause, someone discovered something was wrong.

The subject's body has undergone some special changes, changes that only occur in dead people. A Hungarian medical student at the University of Vienna, Semmelweis Ignaz Philip, discovered the anomaly and immediately asked Lawford Williamson Lange about it.

The latter was still immersed in his own success and did not notice the changes in the subject. When Dr. Lawford examined him, he fell to the ground.

"He's dead."

Suddenly the whole place was in an uproar. It was not uncommon for people to die from excessive inhalation of ether gas, but it happened in full view of the public, which still sounded the alarm to the Austrian medical community.

Is ether a magical gas that saves lives, or a poisonous gas that kills people invisible?

The medical community in Vienna launched a comprehensive debate on this, and the result of the debate was naturally the code for the safe use of ether anesthetic gas. The code stipulated that ether is a dangerous drug and must be prescribed and used by professional doctors.

At the same time, a series of more in-depth studies on the hazards and dosage of ether were also carried out, which made a huge contribution to the anesthesia industry in the Austrian Empire in the future.

As for Dr. Lawford Williamson Lange, although his negligence caused the death of one person, because the legal provisions at that time were not perfect and there were no relevant punishment provisions, and the person who died was not an Austrian, he still Returned to the United States with his winnings.

Franz deeply regretted the death of the gout patient, but he was also glad that he was not enthusiastic enough to choose to do the experiment himself, otherwise he would not be able to escape the reputation of a murderer in the future.

Talia felt that this thing was too dangerous and should consider oral drug anesthesia, such as laudanum and the like. Adjani thought that ether gas could be used as an interrogation tool in the future.