George W. Crile, Ohio's first neurosurgeon, and his relationship with Harvey Cushing

Abstract

✓ Much has been written about Harvey Cushing, his contributions to neurosurgery, and his relationship with many of his contemporaries. Nevertheless, there is no independent report documenting his relationship with Ohio's first neurosurgeon, George W. Crile. Crile's role as a neurosurgeon is limited to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and he is best remembered for other accomplishments. Father of physiological surgery, pioneering surgeon, innovator, inventor, soldier, and the principal founder of the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Crile lived during the golden era of surgery, when the discipline was evolving from a crude and chancy art to an applied science. Crile achieved distinction by performing and describing the first successful radical neck dissection for head and neck cancers and the first successful direct human-to-human blood transfusion. He helped introduce the measurement of blood pressure during surgery, first used cocaine for regional anesthesia in the US, proposed “anoci-anesthesia” to prevent shock during surgery, helped establish one of the first nurse anesthetist schools, and invented the Crile forceps and the pneumatic suit, which was the forerunner to the aviator's antigravity suit. He was a founding member of the American College of Surgeons, its second president (1916–1917), and chairman of the Board of Regents (1913–1939). Crile was a teacher, lecturer, and author who published more than 400 papers and 24 books. In this report the authors trace the relationship between Crile and Cushing from their initial competition for a staff surgeon's position to their common interest in blood pressure, and their roles in the American Ambulance in France and later in World War I.