Before the advent of anesthesia, the surgical
patient had to endure operative pain as
unflinchingly as possible in order to allow the
doctor to work, and the doctor had to work as
quickly as possible to minimize the patient’s
pain. The marks of a great surgeon were not
compassion, patience, and delicacy, but
pitilessness, speed, and strength. The late
18th-century record for an amputation at the
thigh was 35 seconds; in his haste, the
record-setting British surgeon inadvertently
also removed the patient’s left testicle. Due
to the need for haste as well as the potential
for the patient to go into fatal shock from
pain, surgical operations were limited to
mainly external procedures, such as removal
of growths from the surface of the skin and
limb amputations.