Excerpt from The Birmingham Medical Review, Vol. 16: A Monthly Journal of the Medical Sciences; July to December, 1884 Simon's proceeding was wholly justifiable, as was proved by the result but I am much disposed to doubt if as much can be said Of many Of our more recent attempts at removing kidneys. Ihave a list Of nephrectomies completed up to date, one hundred and twenty in all, and the recoveries number only fifty-eight, and this speaks Of the primary results only. Of the secondary results almost nothing is known. It is clear from the dates Of the great majority Of cases, that as soon as publication is possible the cases are set forth and we know nothing more about them. Very many of the successful cases are like Simon's - what might be called primary operations, as extrusion of the kidney through a wound, cases which are in no way comparable to those in which a diseased kidney is removed. The Same thing may be said Of a number Of painful floating kidneys removed, which are noted to be healthy in appearance and without appearance of disease Of any kind, cases also Of ureteral fistula. Of such primary cases there are 25 with 5 deaths, a mortality Of more than 24 Degrees/o. Of cases Of really diseased kidneys there are in my list 84, and of these only 40 survived the operation. How many were really relieved or cured by it we shall probably never know. From this list I have had to eliminate 11 cases as S0 doubtfully recorded that it is impossible to accept the statements about them. The general results may be given to the effect that the general mortality Of nephrectomy is about but that the removal of kidneys that are not diseased is only half (2 Of that which is the result Of the removal Of diseased kidneys This is quite enough to Show that the two classes must not be mixed up together in a table Of statistics any more than one may mix Up primary and secondary amputations. Of the primary cases we find I 3 in which the kidney was removed by a lumbar incision with two deaths. Of the 12 cases in which an abdominal incision was practised there were four deaths, SO that the mortality in the method of Operating is double that Of the lumbar incision. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.