Surgical engineering

This week’s blog by Project Archivist Louise looks at some medical make-do-and-mend!

The case notes of Norman Dott not only contain the stories of ground-breaking surgeries, but also house vivid accounts of the relationship between doctor and patient. Sometimes, correspondence between patients (whether private or hospital cases) and Dott and his team outnumbers accounts of medical treatment!

I’m currently cataloguing the cases that Dott treated just following the Second World War, when he was still splitting his time between Bangour Emergency Medical Service Hospital in Broxburn and the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. Although many aspects of the hardships of conflict were over, shortages of everyday necessities were still very much a reality, and not just in the case of filling the kitchen cupboards.

One gentleman who was treated by Dott for a brain tumour decided to extend his gratitude to the Edinburgh neurosurgical team in an extremely practical way. Using his business connections, he managed to procure lengths of stainless steel from which to manufacture (in Dott’s words) “the nice little machine we use to hold the brain out of the way when we are dealing with tumours difficult of access.”

Dott's specifications for the stainless steel rods (LHB1 CC/24/PR2.4831)

 

The rods (precisely specified by Dott) were then assembled into the surgical apparatus by the “excellent anaesthetist and engineer, Dr Maxwell-Brown.” Maxwell-Brown, like Dott, was well known for his mechanical flair having (like Dott almost did) served an engineering apprenticeship – he fitted up a workshop at Bangour during the Second World War to supply prototypes and to fashion surgical equipment that could not otherwise be procured during shortages (a hobby that continued throughout his life). Maxwell-Brown was particularly known on the Edinburgh wards for his self-retaining brain retractor, and maybe it is for this apparatus that the steel rods were sent by the generous patient. As Dott stated on Maxwell-Brown’s retirement in 1954, “most of our really difficult and outstanding operating is done with the help of instruments he designed and made, and could not be done without them.”

A Student's View

From the 4 - 15 November we had the pleasure of hosting a placement student, Clair Millar, from the University of Glasgow's Information Management and Preservation Masters course. Here she tells us about her time at LHSA.

After I had such a inspiring time at the ‘Archives Taster Day’ with LHSA I couldn’t wait to come back for my two week cataloguing placement after starting the Information Management and Preservation course at Glasgow University.  This part of my course enabled me to finally put some theory into practice in a real archive environment!  As well my own task, Archivist Laura has provided me with an insight to different aspects of the job, including helping with a student seminar about the LHSA collections.  

 

For my placement, I was continuing where last year’s student Sharon had left off, working on cataloguing the papers of Dr Anne McLeod Shepherd.  Luckily for me Sharon is back with LHSA as the Archive Intern and has therefore provided me with some great guidance when working with the collection.  Sharon had already box listed the majority of the collection, so after a couple of days of familiarising myself with the material I was able to get down to work and catalogued two series: ‘The recognition of the ‘Elsie Inglis Memorial Maternity Hospital as a Historic Building’ and ‘The Elsie Inglis Award 2000’.  It has been so helpful for me go through the different processes of cataloguing; from box listing, to organising the materials, listing, numbering and describing, following international archive standards and LHSA guidelines, as well as labelling and re-housing the materials. 
 

Dr Shepherd Papers before cataloguing

The papers of Dr Anne McLeod Shepherd (1922 - 2004) have been really fascinating to delve into.  She herself had a very interesting life beginning her career during the Second World War, working for the Building Research division of Government, testing the effects of bombs.  After the War she completed her degree in Medicine, qualifying as a Doctor in 1950.  Dr Shepherd was actively interested in the female medical profession.  As well as being a serving member of the Medical Women’s Federation, she had a passionate interest in the involvement of medical women during the First World War, particularly in the work of Dr Elsie Maud Inglis (1864 - 1917) whom her papers mainly relate to.

 

After cataloguing and re-housing

D
r Shepherd’s collection is an excellent record of the projects she was involved in to memorialise and recognise the outstanding contribution that Dr Inglis made to women’s health in Edinburgh and also through her work in Serbia, establishing field hospitals during the First World War.  Dr Shepherd campaigned for many years to get the Elsie Inglis Memorial Maternity Hospital recognised as a historic building; she established the Elsie Inglis Heritage Trail, and was instrumental in the creation of a plaque in her memory, erected on the Royal Mile.  This collection has really highlighted for me how important Dr Shepherd’s work was, in helping to play a part in representing historical female heroines across Edinburgh’s landscape that are often overshadowed.    

Clair adding the final touches to her work

This week's blog comes from Conservation Intern Sarah...

I am now over half way through my Conservation internship and the recent couple of weeks have been extremely full and very rewarding. 

Over the past two weeks I have had the amazing opportunity to work with two exhibitions that LHSA are involved with.  On Friday 15 November the ‘200 years, 200 Objects’ exhibition opens at the Talbot Rice Gallery and on 5 December ‘Collect.ed’ exhibition opens at the Main Library Exhibition Gallery, Edinburgh University.  As part of these two exhibitions, LHSA has lent an extensive amount of items to go on display. It has been my job to make sure that all of them have been condition checked, packed, transported and then installed. This was all done alongside LHSA Manager Ruth, and in conjunction with the curators, artists and exhibition installation teams from each exhibition.

I have also been busy running a conservation training day. This training day was designed for people who are thinking about conservation as a career, and want to get a better idea of the kinds of treatments that a conservator may do on a day to day basis. And for people who already work in the heritage sector, such as an Archivist who may require a better understanding of basic conservation problems and solutions. The day went really well and all 4 students seemed to have an enjoyable day and hopefully learnt a few interesting facts about conservation.

The rest of my time has been spent making folders for the re-housing of flattened parchment title deeds with pendant seals. I have designed a version of a 4-flap folder using acid free card that will encase the parchment. 

4-flap folder, with parchment on acid-free base

The parchment itself will then be attached to an acid-free card base using archival linen tape; this is used to reduce any movement of the parchment within the 4-flap folder. Some of the pendant seals are rather fragile and desiccated; so these seals will have an extra support of a Tyvek pouch/bag that will encase the wax/resin seal.

Parchment and seal in new 4-flap folder