Graduate Johns Hopkins School for Nurses.
_From the American Journal of Nursing._
1. The room selected for the operation should be near the bath-room,
as a porcelain tub filled with bichlorid solution of the strength of
1: 1000 makes an excellent arrangement for disinfecting the washbowls,
pitchers, platters, plates, etc., which are to be used during the
operation for the solutions, instruments, needles, and ligatures.
2. If the carpet cannot be removed, it may be protected with oilcloth,
rubber sheeting, or newspapers, over which sheets can be pinned.
3. The windows can be frosted by rubbing sapolio on the inner surface,
thus preventing any possible observation from the outside.
4. Two small tables placed together to form one of the required size,
old blankets being used to make the tables of uniform height and also
to furnish a comfortable surface for the patient, can be used for
an operating-table, care being taken to cover the blankets with a
bed-rubber or table oilcloth and a sheet, securely folded under, and
tied to the table with muslin bandages.
5. A Kelly pad can be improvised by tightly rolling a blanket and
covering it with a rubber sheet, two ends of which are to be pinned
together and used to conduct the solutions into the foot-tub below.
6. An ironing-board or the leaf of an extension table, supported by two
chairs, makes a good table for instruments or solution basins.
7. An ordinary clothes-boiler, one-third filled with water, can be
used as a sterilizer, the instruments rolled in gauze, and the brushes
and orange sticks (for the doctor’s hands) being immersed therein.
The necessary dressings, towels, sheets, fountain syringe, etc., are
sterilized by hanging them in a hammock or sling hung from the handles
of the boiler. A kitchen fork, lengthened by securely fastening to it
an iron spoon, makes a convenient utensil with which to remove the
articles from the boiler.
8. An ordinary sheet folded over at the top makes an excellent gown for
the operator, if the ends be carefully taken up under the arms, crossed
in the back, and used as sleeves for the shoulders and upper part of
the arm, the middle of the upper hem of the sheet being pinned to the
collar in front.
9. Water boiled in the clothes-boiler or tea-kettles can be quickly
cooled by placing pitchers of it, covered with sterile towels or
cloths, in a dish-pan or foot-tub of cracked ice.
10. A kettle of water kept boiling during the operation is a great
convenience.
11. Salt solution filtered into household preserving jars can be
sterilized in the wash-boiler with the other articles.
12. A stretcher can be improvised by slipping two window-poles or
broom-handles into the folds of a sheet folded the proper size and
securely fastened with safety-pins.
13. The Trendelenburg position can be secured by using an ordinary
kitchen chair comfortably padded with a rubber-covered pillow and
sheet, the back of the chair being placed under the patient.
14. The patient can be put in the lithotomy position by placing under
the knees a padded walking-stick, to the ends of which is fastened a
sheet folded diagonally, and passed under the shoulders.