A young Louisiana-born doctor is fighting a test tube battle against an uncertain enemy that causes many deaths a-mong surgery patients.
Dr. Isidore Cohn, Jr, 31-year-old instructor in surgery at Louisiana State University's School of Medicine, is convinced there is a way to free people from the threat of death from complications of intes-tional obstructions, a comparatively common ailment.
At the turn of the century 60 per cent of those treated for this ailment died and in the last ten years about 1000 cases have been admitted to Charity Hospital. The present rate is 10-20 per cent.
The young doctor said, "We are most interested in those who are not completely helped by removal of the obstruction." He believes interference with the blood supply before the operation results in the loss of normal function of the bowel and possible consequential death. Dr. Cohn is approaching this problem with the help of dogs, who, he says get better care than some human beings. Buy the use of antibiotics, he has prolonged a doomed dog's life at least three times; this a longer time than reported by any other researcher.
