Obstetrical Antisepsis

Childbed Fever

Childbed fever, also known as puerperal fever, includes any number of infections that occur after birth. Childbed fever was especially deadly before early 20th century improvements in postpartum care and a greater understanding of microbial infections. In 1888 Dr. Charles James Cullingworth noted in a lecture at St. Thomas's Hospital in London, "that almost the whole of this mortality may in the future be avoided, and that puerperal fever, both in its fatal and nonfatal manifestations, may be practically stamped out." Once physicians understood the connection between their tendency not to wash their hands or sterilize instruments between seeing patients and the spreading of disease, devices such as the sterilizer below were devised to make antisepsis a widespread habit and achieve Dr. Cullingworth's vision.

Sterilizer

The acceptance of Lister’s antiseptic surgical technique was attended by the problem of rusting and corrosion aggravated by the constant exposure of instruments to carbolic acid. Spencer Wells and other gynecologists who were early adopters of “clean” surgery for ovariotomy created a demand for nickel-plated instruments and that were sold under Spencer Wells’s name in 1878. The Buffalo Dental Mfg. Co, advertised nickel-plating since 1870, under license from the United Nickel Company of NY, whose first patent is dated Aug. 21, 1866. With the advent of sterilization with boiling water, the issue of rust became an even greater problem but was solved instantaneously by electrolytic nickel plating, followed by expensive stainless steel first utilized in 1916.