Was just reading on pre 20th century amputations and how they strived to be as fast as possible, cutting through bone and all.
Why didn’t they just amputate at the joint, like a butcher cuts pork or beef? That would have been way faster than sawing off though bone.
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Years ago, I had a fascinating conversation with a Revolutionary War historian who told me in those days, amputations were most often performed by someone with experience as a butcher but were overseen by a doctor [who in those days were book worms, according to the historian, and had little hands-on surgical training. Guys who managed infections like Lister and real surgeons like the Mayo brothers didn’t appear until the second half of the 1800’s].
Preserving skin to make a flap and keeping some tissue to fold over for a stump were key, so amputations started relatively slowly, but gained speed as the flap was folded back and the surgeon/butcher moved through more tissue, tied off what he could and then cut the bone. I didn’t think to ask at the time what happened to tendons. I’m guessing they’d leave them intact if they could. Time spent with a tourniquet on a limb had to be limited in order to not kill tissue needed for the stump, so there must have been some element to “do what you can”.
[Skip this if you get grossed out easily]:
I was interested to learn that a set of “z” shaped stitches were used to close amputations. Not super tight, with the edges of the wound pulled together to allow for some bleeding. The skin was not folded inward to make a tight closure like today. Instead, the flexible stitch would allow the wound to stretch a little and also allow it to open and let infection, if any, weep out.
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