Abstract
It remains a rhetorical question whether an understanding of surgical history is important to the maturation and continued education and training of a surgeon. Conversely, it is hardly necessary to dwell on the heuristic value that an appreciation of history provides in developing adjunctive humanistic, literary, and philosophical tastes. Clearly, medicine is a lifelong learning process that should be an enjoyable and rewarding experience. For a surgeon, the study of surgical history contributes greatly toward making this learning process more pleasurable and is invigorating. To trace the evolution of what one does on a daily basis and to understand it from a historical perspective are enviable goals. It reality, there is no way to separate present-day surgery and one’s own practice from the experiences of all the surgeons in all the preceding years.
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Rutkow, I.M. (2008). Origins of Modern Surgery. In: Norton, J.A., et al. Surgery. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-68113-9_1
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