The Exploits of Elaine | Page 8

attention. I was much
impressed and had imported the treatment to Hillside.
While we waited I reached into my desk and drew out the letter to
which I referred, which ended, I recall:
"As Dr. Reinstrom is in America, he will probably call on you. I am
sure you will be glad to know him.
"With kindest regards, I am,
"Fraternally yours,
"EMIL SCHWARZ, M. D.,
"Director, Leipsic Institute of Medicine."
"Most happy to meet you, Dr. Reinstrom," I greeted the new arrival, as
he entered our office.
For several minutes we sat and chatted of things medical here and
abroad.
"What is it, Doctor," I asked finally, "that interests you most in
America?"
"Oh," he replied quickly with an expressive gesture, "it is the
broadmindedness with which you adopt the best from all over the
world, regardless of prejudice. For instance, I am very much interested
in the new twilight sleep. Of course you have borrowed it largely from

us, but it interests me to see whether you have modified it with practice.
In fact I have come to the Hillside Sanitarium particularly to see it used.
Perhaps we may learn something from you."
It was most gracious and both Dr. Thompson and myself were charmed
by our visitor. I reached over and touched a call-button and our head
nurse entered from a rear room.
"Are there any operations going on now?" I asked.
She looked mechanically at her watch. "Yes, there are two cases, now, I
think," she answered.
"Would you like to follow our technique, Doctor?" I asked, turning to
Dr. Reinstorm.
"I should be delighted," he acquiesced.
A moment later we passed down the corridor of the Sanitarium, still
chatting. At the door of a ward I spoke to the attendant who indicated
that a patient was about to be anesthetized, and Reinstrom and I entered
the room.
There, in perfect quiet, which is an essential part of the treatment, were
several women patients lying in bed in the ward. Before us two nurses
and a doctor were in attendance on one.
I spoke to the Doctor, Dr. Holmes, by the way, who bowed politely to
the distinguished Dr. Reinstrom, then turned quickly to his work.
"Miss Sears," he asked of one of the nurses, "will you bring me that
hypodermic needle? How are you getting on, Miss Stern?" to the other
who was scrubbing the patient's arm with antiseptic soap and water,
thoroughly sterilizing the skin.
"You will see, Dr. Reinstrom." I interposed in a low tone, "that we
follow in the main your Freiburg treatment. We use scopolamin and
narkophin."

I held up the bottle, as I said it, a rather peculiar shaped bottle, too.
"And the pain?" he asked.
"Practically the same as in your experience abroad. We do not render
the patient unconscious, but prevent her from remembering anything
that goes on."
Dr. Holmes, the attending physician, was just starting the treatment.
Filling his hypodermic, he selected a spot on the patient's arm, where it
had been scrubbed and sterilized, and injected the narcotic.
"How simply you do it all, here!" exclaimed Reinstrom in surprise and
undisguised admiration. "You Americans are wonderful!"
"Come--see a patient who is just recovering," I added, much flattered
by the praise, which, from a German physician, meant much.
Reinstrom followed me out of the door and we entered a private room
of the hospital where another woman patient lay in bed carefully
watched by a nurse.
"How do you do?" I nodded to the nurse in a modulated tone.
"Everything progressing favorably?"
"Perfectly," she returned, as Reinstrom, Haynes and myself formed a
little group about the bedside of the unconscious woman.
"And you say they have no recollection of anything that happens?"
asked Reinstrom.
"Absolutely none--if the treatment is given properly," I replied
confidently.
I picked up a piece of bandage which was the handiest thing about me
and tied it quite tightly about the patient's arm.
As we waited, the patient, who was gradually coming from under the
drug, roused herself.

"What is that--it hurts!" she said putting her hand on the bandage I had
tied tightly.
"That is all right. Just a moment. I'll take it off. Don't you remember
it?" I asked.
She shook her head. I smiled at Reinstrom.
"You see, she has no recollection of my tying the bandage on her arm,"
I pointed out.
"Wonderful!" ejaculated Reinstrom as we left the room.
All the way back to the office he was loud in his praises and thanked us
most heartily, as he put on his hat and coat and shook hands a cordial
good-bye.
Now comes the strange part of my story. After Reinstrom had gone, Dr.
Holmes, the attending physician of the woman whom we had seen
anesthetized, missed his syringe and the