Abstract
FOR the good reason that the less the quantity of alcohol absorbed by uses for which alternatives can be substituted the more there will be available for the manufacture of munitions, the authorities are exploring the avenues by which economy in the employment of spirit can be effected. One of the channels through which extremely large quantities of alcohol flow in the course of a year is connected with surgical and hospital practice, and the attention of the Government departments concerned with the conservation of supplies of material is focused on this channel at the present time. It may well be that official instructions will be issued shortly to medical and hospital officers and nursing staffs of Service and other departments tq exercise strict economy in the use of spirit for medical and surgical purposes as well as in nursing practice. Action will not stop at the Navy, Army and Air Force Services, for a strong appeal is likely to be made to surgeons and hospital staffs generally to use alcohol as sparingly as possible; it is probable also that recommendations will be issued by a body of recognized experts on the ways in which the use of alcohol may be avoided without prejudice to patients. The sterilization and storing of instruments, the habit common among surgeons of using alcohol for their hands before the gloves are put on, the use of tincture of iodine for the preparation of the patient's skin for operative incisions, the custom of swabbing spirit over the suture line when stitches are removed and the use of methylated spirit for preventing bed sores are the chief outlets of alcohol in surgical work and nursing methods.
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Surgical and Hospital Spirit: Economy Necessary. Nature 147, 740–741 (1941). https://doi.org/10.1038/147740e0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/147740e0