Hacker News Reader

Comment by OminousWeapons | Hacker News Reader

Less crazy but also very cool: the first coronary catheterization (insertion of a tube through a peripheral vein into the heart) was performed by doctor William Forssmann on himself. Forssmann's colleagues did not believe a coronary catheterization was possible without injuring the heart and possibly killing the patient, so he cathed himself, walked to imaging while cathed, and got X-rayed to prove the catheter was in his right atrium and that it could be done.

View on HN

Great story! I really admire those who dare to make such bold move. I also feel sorry for those who did similar things but failed and ended up as a forgotten tragedy. They are all heroes.

I’m not certain that doing something like that voluntarily in the absence of an emergency is _less_ crazy. Great story.

There's an interesting book called "Who Goes First?"[1] about something that used to be much more common than it is today: self-experimentation in medicine.

[1] - https://www.amazon.com/Who-Goes-First-Lawrence-Altman/dp/052...

Ethics is great and all but makes it hard to do much original research. This sounds crass but try getting a very routine IRB proposal passed, and you'll see what I mean.

Self experimentation remains relatively out of reach of the ethicists and so should be kept in mind for the more creative researcher types.

Yes, amen. And what better reason to have children than to have accessible human subjects?

Preferably twins, so you can have a control group.

See also, an old story by Scott Alexander: https://archive.fo/eSbZb.

Hadn’t heard of this. Just got a used copy for myself through Bookfinder!

Hey... Thanks for mentioning Bookfinder. Seems like a great resource. I ordered a copy myself as well. :)

This. 20 years on the internet and right now is when I first learn of Bookfinder, which looks like a wonderful resource. Just like HN, where I was just reading and learning from the comments on this remarkable self-operation when, like you, I serendipitously stumbled on Bookfinder. HN is one of the few places online where I can count on finding an unexpected wormhole into a different knowledge universe. My favorite website of them all.

Not an operation but:

Barry Marshall drank the bacteria Helicobacter pylori to prove it's involvement in gastritis and ulcers.

Before that everybody assumed bacteria wouldn't survive stomach acid and these sicknesses were causes by stress.

He treated with antibiotics afterwards and got the nobel-price.

Was the Nobel prize for the discovery of helicobacter in the stomach lining, which had essentially been rediscovered as he found it in some old analysis

Surely he experimented on some animals first?

So he inserted the catheter blind??

I just read through the story, and not quite - he got the catheter started partway, and then the nurse who he'd tricked into thinking she would be the test subject (he needed her to get supplies) walked him to radiology so he see what he was doing when he got to the tricky parts.

Yes. I read about this when I was in medical school and was astounded at his boldness. FWIW he won the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his accomplishment.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com