Remarks on the Rational Treatment of Phthisis, with Reference to Nordrach Sanatorium

KWIC" o= 983 I , 983~~~~p oint: the question as to whether the life should be loaded where an operation had been done with an apparently successful issue.He quite agreed with him that a certain extra premium should be put on, because he had seen cases where that idea had been borne out within the last two months.A child of 2 years had a mastoid operation done some time ago for mastoid disease, and after three weeks in hospital went out quite well.From the age of 3 to Q she had an interval of perfect health, but there must have been some mischief left behind, as there was a recurrence of the old trouble, which spread to the brain, and temporo-sphenoidal abscess re- sulted, and as the child was in a critical condition he operated.Next morning he went down to see her, as he thought, dead, but he found her well.The case did splendidly, and she went out apparently perfectly cured.But the question arose, if that life was to be insured, what were they to do, as there might be a recrudescence?One point they should insist upon was that, even though operation had been done, the patient might be sitting over a powder magazine, or one might get a recrudescence of the disease.In this operation complications might not have occurred if the original Stacke's operation had been done instead of trephining the mastoid antrum only, as the cavities were not thrown into onie, and therefore some disease was probably left behind.Every case must be treated on its own merits; that was very important and obvious to all of them.They got on the forms of insurance companies certain questions and were asked, and, so to speak, to draw a hard-and-fast line.It was absolutely iiipossible to draw a hard-and-fast line; it was,very important when it got into a law court.It was ridicu- lous and foolish to swear anything absolute in reference to the human body, for cases must be treated on their own merits, and it seemed to him that it would save insurance companies a lot of risk, and would be of some advantage if, if in doubt, the person referred to consulted an expert, and each case was treated absolutely on its own merits.