Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Leonid Rogozov served as the doctor on the 6th Soviet Antarctic Expedition, September 1960 to October 1961. This expedition established the Novolazarevskaya Station, on the Schirmacher Oasis- nominative false advertising if ever there was.
Leonid Rogozov served as the doctor on the 6th Soviet Antarctic Expedition, September 1960 to October 1961. This expedition established the Novolazarevskaya Station, on the Schirmacher Oasis- nominative false advertising if ever there was.
They’d come by ship from Russia; it took over a month. The ship wouldn’t be back for a year.
Setting up the base was OK; winter struck by February & the dozen men hunkered down to see it out, hoping not to recreate The Thing no doubt.
Setting up the base was OK; winter struck by February & the dozen men hunkered down to see it out, hoping not to recreate The Thing no doubt.
On 29 April, Rogozov started to feel sick. This was bad. He was the only doctor. His general fatigue & dizziness particularised soon enough into pain on his right side & peritonitis became apparent. It was his appendix.
Diagnosis easy. Treatment hard. They were a thousand miles from theoretical help (the Mirny Soviet station); any stations more nearby were held by other powers, reported they had no aircraft available & heavy blizzards meant they couldn't have landed even if they existed.
He didn’t have any choice. The 27 year old junior doctor Rogozov would have to operate on himself.
This is hard in & of itself. Harder yet because he was nauseous- & getting worse fast.
This is hard in & of itself. Harder yet because he was nauseous- & getting worse fast.
He took a little novocaine as local anaesthetic, propped himself up a mirror Master & Commander style, and took a scalpel to his own abdomen.
I think that we will forgive a man operating in these conditions for making a mistake. He made one- he cut into his intestine & had to sew that back up before going on.
No more anaesthetic, by the way - he needed a clear head, & still had a 5 inch hole in his side with a dodgy appendix behind it.
Still with me?
Still with me?
He was nauseous & weak, requiring rest breaks frequently to recover. But he went on & cut out his own appendix. It was black at the base & would have burst imminently. He then stitched himself up.
Rogozov wasn’t alone, of course. His colleagues were with him, passing instruments to him on demand & with instructions on the adrenaline shot they were to give him if he passed out, so he could carry on. It wasn’t needed.
(Charmingly, he wrote later about his concern as he operated on himself for *their* wellbeing as they looked on, as they were so pale and terrified.)
He was back to work within 2 weeks, received the Order of the Red Banner of Labour & worked until his death in 2000 as Head of Surgery in St Petersburg (he'd gone back to work at the hospital the day after getting back from Antarctica).
What’s today’s lesson? Well... next time you think you’re having a bad day, imagine how Rogozov felt the day he looked down at his gut, & realised, as the Antarctic blizzard howled outside, what the swelling & pain meant he’d have - despite his feverishness - to do to himself.
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