Medicine: Capsules, Dec. 13, 1954

¶ A team from the New York Medical College (Flower and Fifth Avenue Hospitals) submitted an encouraging report on longevity to the A.M.A. meeting in Miami (see above). The aging process (marked by hardening of the arteries, high levels of fatty substances in the blood and dilatation of the aorta) tends to reverse itself after 60, the researchers found, and anybody who survives the "threshold age" by reaching 75 has a good chance of going on to reach the 100 mark.

¶ Four-fifths of all victims of stab wounds through the heart die before reaching a hospital, but the rest have a three-to-one chance of survival if treated promptly and properly, reported Houston's Dr. Denton Cooley in Miami. He and his colleagues advise against immediate operation under emergency conditions. Doctors should first try to resuscitate the patient by draining blood from the heart sac and giving transfusions to counteract shock. Only if this is not quickly effective should they open the chest to stitch up the heart, for it is in this drastic operation, which often has to be performed hurriedly and under non-sterile conditions, that most deaths occur.

¶ In a report to military surgeons meeting in Washington, D.C. . . . last week, Psychiatrists Lucio E. Gatto and Henry L. Dean reported on medical goldbrickers in military service (or "nestlers," as the doctors call them): "Many give such convincing accounts of vague, disabling aches, pains and discomforts,that the unsuspecting physician will find himself hospitalizing them . . . in search of obscure, undetermined, and even rare diseases." Drs. Gatto and Dean suggested establishing centers near Army camps to provide outpatient treatment for potential nestlers, which would "reduce the financial burden of the nation."