Hidalgo de Agüero, Bartolomé (1604)

Thesoro de la verdadera cirugía y vía particular contra la común. Sevilla: Francisco Pérez, 1604, pp. 32v.
At the end of the 16th century, the Spanish surgeon Bartolomé Hidalgo de Agüero collected statistics showing that dry treatment of wounds resulted in fewer deaths than the orthodox, wet method.

Title page(s)

HidalgodeAgueroCover.jpg.

Key passage(s)

Hidalgo 1604 kp

Translation

“I took as a measure the Register Book of the aforementioned Hospital of the Cardinal [of Seville], where the wounded patients are recorded, and it has been shown that last year, in 1583, 456 patients with all kinds of wounds were admitted; 436 were discharged and 20 died. During the two months and a half in which a separate record was made, at my request, of the patients wounded in the head, 57 were admitted, 50 were discharged healed and 7 died.  In the years in which I and my predecessors used the common method [wet healing] we find a larger number of dead than living patients. The disinterested and dispassionate men should observe how much more advantageous is the particular [dry healing] than the common method.”

Translation by Carlos Solís

Portrait(s)

 Bartolomé Hidalgo de Agüero (1531-1597)

Hidalgo portrait

Hildalgo portrait de Francisco Pacheco