{"id":279,"date":"2010-06-25T14:49:40","date_gmt":"2010-06-25T14:49:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tmcldev.wpengine.com\/mcgovern\/2010\/06\/25\/thingamajig-baleen-and-hyfrecator\/"},"modified":"2019-08-30T18:02:22","modified_gmt":"2019-08-30T18:02:22","slug":"thingamajig-baleen-and-hyfrecator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/library.tmc.edu\/mcgovern\/2010\/06\/25\/thingamajig-baleen-and-hyfrecator\/","title":{"rendered":"Thingamajig: baleen and Hyfrecator"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Alethea Drexler<\/strong>
\nArchives Assistant<\/em>
\nThingamajig took a vacation last week, but it’s back.
\nThe mystery objects in the black lacquered case were called “bougies,” and they were basically medical pipe-cleaners.\u00a0 They were used to remove debris from small wounds and orifices; the one of the most commonly-cited uses involved dislodging urethral calculi.
\nThey are made of baleen, the keratin structure that some species of whale use to filter plankton out of the water for food.\u00a0 Baleen is the “whalebone” that was once used to stiffen ladies’ corsets.
\n

\"\"<\/a>
Hyfrecator<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nThis week’s Thingamajig comes, again, from the A.M. Autrey, M.D. collection.
\nThis is a Hyfrecator.\u00a0 The name is actually a portmanteau derived from “hi<\/strong>gh-freq<\/strong>uency eradicator<\/strong>.”\u00a0 It is used in electrosurgery, mostly for removing skin blemishes and reducing bleeding.\u00a0 It differs from electrocautery in that electrosurgery is based on generating heat within tissues by use of an electrical current, and electrocautery applies heat externally.\u00a0 Both use probes; you can see our hyfrecator’s next to it, on the right, in the box.\u00a0 We also have a second, smaller, box with more probes in different shapes, for other uses.\u00a0 (I once worked for a veterinarian and my boss often used an electrocautery<\/em> to remove moles and small lesions from dogs.\u00a0 We all dreaded it because it smelled terrible.\u00a0 I hope electrosurgery is less, um, aromatic.)
\nThis one was made by the Birtcher Corporation of Los Angeles, and is, according to the manual included in the box, a 1950 edition.\u00a0 The manual says that the device was introduced in 1940, so this is a fairly early example.\u00a0 Hyfrecators are still in use today.
\nAlas, modern hyfrecators don’t come in sleek, black, Bakelite shells.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Alethea Drexler Archives Assistant Thingamajig took a vacation last week, but it’s back. The mystery objects in the black lacquered case were called “bougies,” and they were basically medical pipe-cleaners.\u00a0 They were used to remove debris from small wounds and orifices; the one of the most commonly-cited uses involved dislodging urethral calculi. They are […]<\/p>\n

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