Episode 55: Sinusitis Surgery… How Did They Do It? [2]
Episode 55: Sinusitis Surgery… How Did They Do It? [2]
“I guess I’m a bit stupid.”
Joseph laughed as he watched me turn my head to the side with a kettle stuck to my nose.
“Not just a bit. We’re all complete idiots, aren’t we?”
Alfred was the same. Damn bastards. Why was I even doing this?
“Pfft.”
Even the patient joined in. Shouldn’t you be more respectful? You were the one who was in a coffin, remember? I literally brought you back from the dead, and now you’re laughing at me for sticking a kettle spout up my nose?
“Kek.”
What made it worse was that I couldn’t talk back. I mean, what could you say when you were pouring water up your nose? And since the nasal passages were connected to the throat, the water started coming out of my mouth.
“Hahahahaha!”
“What is this?!”
“Ha ha ha!”
All three of them burst out laughing at once. Dogs, all of them… This was a good treatment! An ENT colleague of mine once said this alone could resolve half of all sinusitis cases.
“Ugh.”
Thankfully, I only planned to demonstrate the technique, so I didn’t pour much water. The little show ended quickly.
“If you do it like this—”
Ugh.
Still, some water lingered in my sinuses and dripped into my mouth, cutting me off mid-sentence.
“Ha ha ha!”
More laughter.
Fine. I could barely get the words out.
“You can drain pus more effectively this way. But the condition looks a bit serious, so for now… limit it to twice a day.”
“Twice a day? Are you joking?”
The patient waved his hand and laughed. I wanted to punch him. But obviously, I couldn’t.
“Wait.”
“Huh? Are you serious?”
“Yes.”
“Didn’t you invent anesthesia because the patient was in pain?”
“Not all treatments can be pain-free.”
I ordered the two assistants to hold the patient down. Then I pressed the kettle spout into his nostril.
“Salt water works best, but if the concentration is too high, it could damage the mucous membrane. So let’s stick with plain water until I find the right balance.”
“What? No, please! Spare me!”
“I’m not going to kill you. I’m going to treat you.”
“Where else would you find treatment like this?!”
“And where else would you just stand by while a man with a headache is bleeding from his nose?”
“That’s…”
The patient went silent, one nostril stretched around the kettle spout. Good. That was how it should be.
“Now, tilt your head like this.”
“Eugh…”
“Hold your breath while the water flows.”
“Eugh…”
“Don’t talk. Just keep your mouth open. Here it comes.”
I poured the water into the patient’s nostril.
“Mmm.”
“Mmmf.”
As I watched the swelling drain out, I started to understand why doctors didn’t usually do this. It looked a little… well, a little too intense. I was clearly giving treatment, but from the outside, it looked like torture.
“This…”
“Is this really okay…?”
Even Joseph and Alfred, men raised in the age of barbarism, were frowning.
Come on. What kind of faces were those?
You babies… you’ve seen real horrors. This only looks bad, but it’s actually an excellent treatment.
I looked up at the sky without a trace of shame.
Gurgle.
Proof: the water running out of the patient’s mouth was cloudy. Yellow mucus streamed out nonstop. No, not mucus. Pus. Thick, compacted globs were being flushed out.
“Oh my God.”
Once the water ran out and nothing more came from the patient’s mouth, I asked, “How do you feel?”
“Uh… much better. My nose stings a little… achoo… but my head feels lighter.”
“Good.”
I turned and gave Joseph and Alfred a look. Well? Impressed yet? Sure enough, they looked awed. And look at that. His headache improved even without any bleeding. It was proof, plain and simple, that this so-called theory of “cadaveric fluids” was nonsense.
As I was about to speak, they beat me to it.
“I guess we should’ve drained the pus, not the blood.”
“And… yeah, the pain came from the buildup.”
Were these guys serious? Fuck. I almost swore out loud. Why were they so obsessed with removing something?
Tension headaches, migraines, cluster headaches. What exactly were you going to “remove” for those?
Now that I thought about it, how did you normally treat a headache? Right. Medication.
Maybe I should look for some willow trees?
I knew aspirin came from willow bark.
The catch was… I didn’t know how to make it.
While I silently grappled with how to save mankind, the two quacks were off discussing Hippocrates and the theory of the Four Humors. Meanwhile, the patient, though shaken, seemed genuinely satisfied. It was clear he would recover without any invasive procedures.
“Really… thank you.”
“Yes, yes. You can continue doing this at home, but you need to be cautious.”
Naturally, there were conditions. For this treatment to work, it had to be done consistently and safely. Just pouring in random water wasn’t going to help.
For instance, what would happen if you used water from the Thames?
The thought alone made me shake my head.
“You have to boil the water first. It must be clean. Understand?”
“Ah, yes. But… my house is a bit far from any water source.”
“Still, you must try.”
“Yes, yes. I’ll do my best.”
It wasn’t going to be easy. The slums of London really were hell on earth. Boiled water? That meant you needed both water and fire. Did they even have access to either?
A few days later, Jémel came to see me.
For some reason, I was already irritated. There were so many things wrong I couldn’t even decide where to start.
“Yes, Dr. Jémel?”
I turned to greet him.
Oh boy. Now what’s Dr. Liston up to? Whatever it is, it won’t work.
“You… Why are patients coming to you?”
Jémel asked, his cheeks trembling with frustration. I just nodded and tilted my head.
Clearly, he didn’t know I was the one who brought back the patient he had written off as dead. Well, fair enough. If I were a patient, I wouldn’t return to the doctor who gave me that nightmare either.
So I decided to lean into it. Confidence was key.
“Well?”
“Answer me properly. Why do headache patients go to you instead of me?”
“I really don’t know.”
“You’re seriously going to play dumb?”
“Hold on, Dr. Jémel.”
He started to lose his temper as I kept playing innocent. Of course, that only made it more satisfying. The more I acted oblivious, the more frustrated he got. I wasn’t about to make this easy for him.
Then…
“What’s that supposed to mean about my brother?”
“Brother?”
“Oh, didn’t you hear? Dr. Pyeong is my sworn brother.”
“No… Professors have honor! How—”
“Are you really going to talk about honor?”
As I had said many times, the nineteenth century was a mix of science and barbarism. Lovecraft didn’t write the Cthulhu Mythos for nothing. It all fit a little too well.
Dr. Liston, without a word, made a show of adjusting gloves he wasn’t even wearing. It was like he was about to throw one in Jémel’s face, a challenge to a duel. And some nobles still supported that kind of thing.
Jémel backed down.
“No, wait, what is this all of a sudden?”
“Maybe it’s not very gentlemanly to come out swinging before you’ve heard the full story?”
Coming at someone like this in front of Dr. Liston? Bold. Very bold.
“That—”
“Let’s go. I’ll handle this.”
“Wow…”
Jémel finally gave up and backed off, but not before giving me a look that said this wasn’t over. But what could he do? Blundell was already on my side. And now Liston, too?
“What happened?”
Liston asked, and I gave him the full report. As expected, he burst out laughing.
“So… Jémel was the one who buried that quack alive thinking he was dead, and you brought him back?”
“Yes, brother.”
“Ha ha ha! I knew it. And instead of bleeding him, you flushed out the pus? Now that’s new. If it worked, I might even want to try it myself…”
“Since I’m not licensed yet, I can’t see outpatients.”
“That’s nothing to worry about. I’m licensed. Just treat them under my name.”
“Ah.”
Classic Liston. Always skirting the rules, but it worked.
“Really?”
Headaches weren’t exactly my specialty, but I couldn’t just leave them to Jémel. And Robert? No way. Both Overthrow and Match were quacks.
“All right then. Starting today, you’ll see patients under my name.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And don’t worry. Your medical license is already under review. It won’t be long now. Blundell, surprisingly, has been very proactive.”
“Yes, haha. We’ve worked together on a few things.”
And just like that, I began seeing patients under Liston’s outpatient clinic. It was mostly a good thing. Even if I couldn’t cure them all, I wasn’t doing any harm. As expected, sinusitis was rampant in London at the time. Nearly every case boiled down to the same thing.
“Hmm… It’s better, but not completely gone.”
“Yes, doctor. Please cure me.”
The problem was that nasal irrigation didn’t cure everyone. Some cases required surgery.
Guess I’ll have to get more practice, huh?
Looks like I’ll be heading back into the Anatomy Lab again.
Translator’s Notes:
ENT — Short for ear, nose, and throat medicine, the field that treats conditions involving those areas.
Sinusitis — Inflammation or infection of the sinuses, often causing headache, nasal discharge, facial pressure, and pain that worsens when bending forward.
Nasal Irrigation — Rinsing the inside of the nose and nasal passages with water or saline to clear mucus, pus, or irritants.
Mucous Membrane — The moist tissue lining body passages such as the nose, mouth, and throat.
Hippocrates — Ancient Greek physician traditionally called the “Father of Medicine.”
Four Humors — An ancient medical theory that illness came from imbalance among four bodily fluids: blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile.
Cadaveric Fluids — Refers here to a mistaken theory that fluids or contamination from corpses caused illness. The narrator treats it as flawed compared with modern medical understanding.
Willow Bark / Aspirin — Willow bark contains compounds related to salicylates, which are connected to the development of aspirin.
Cthulhu Mythos — A fictional horror mythology associated with H. P. Lovecraft, used here to describe the strange, irrational atmosphere of nineteenth-century science and superstition.