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Dr Murray's case of ligation of the abdominal aorta - Somerset Hospital, 1834 A forgotten historical event
Abstract
While reading a recent anicle on the extraperitoneal exposure of the abdominal aona,l my attention was drawn to a comment in the discussion by Dr Charles Rob, who referred briefly to an operation carried out in Cape Town in 1834 by a Dr Murray. The operation consisted of the extraperitoneal exposure and ligation of the aona· for an expanding iliac aneurysm. The reference provided by Dr Rob was to a brief description entitled 'Dr Murray's case of ligature of the abdominal aona', which had appeared in the Annals of che Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1984.2 The original description of this operation is to be found in both the first (1839) and second editions (1850) of Surgical Anatomy of che Arteries and DescnjICive Anatomy of che Hearr by Valentine Flood.3 Despite the obvious historical significance of this operation, its performance is not recorded or noted in the standard texts that deal with the early history of medicine in the Cape,4-1 nor was its performance known to knowledgeable medical historians (J. H. Louw and J. c. de Villiers - personal communications).
