Part 12

Cluthe Truss Has Done Away with All Need For Operation, Except in Occasional Cases

People used to think that an operation was the only way to cure rupture-- thought they had to be cut open.

Just as people used to know no better than to undergo bleeding, no matter in what way they were sick. Histories and biographies tell us it was the loss of blood from this barbarous bleeding which led to George Washington's death.

But nowadays we never hear of bleeding.

Just as fever patients are no longer denied ice water and ice applications. Though, not so many years ago, people were literally allowed to burn up with fever.

Operation for rupture, for reasons stated below has never been much more than a life-or-death chance, even for those with a rugged constitution. Thousands of ruptured people have died under the surgeon's knife.

Oftentimes a weak heart-- because of the ether-- makes it unsafe even to attempt operation.

And it has always been a big expense which not one in a hundred could afford. Even though it had no dangers, the cost and the long lay-off from work or business make it useless for the majority of sufferers to think of an operation.

The reasons operation is so risky for most people are these:

The sufferer is seldom in condition for an operation, is run down, the vitality is low-- that is why the muscles over the intestines have weakened and spread.

Another grave danger lies in the fact that a very large opening must be made-- many delicate tissues cut through-- before the surgeon can reach the weakened muscles which caused the rupture.

Moreover, in a surgical operation, the relaxed muscles are tightened simply by shortening them-- by cutting out a piece.

But nothing is done to strengthen these muscles. Nature is in no way assisted. The parts usually remain weak-- that is why, when a man leaves the hospital after an operation for rupture, he is usually told to wear a truss or support.

And that is why, in about six out of every ten apparently successful operations, the rupture sooner or later breaks out anew.

So we would never advise an operation, save as a last resort. As in strangulated hernia, where there is no hope except through heroic measures.

Save in very rare cases, there is now no need whatever to undergo the dangers of an operation-- no need to risk the surgeon's knife. No need to incur the big expense of going to a hospital-- no need to lose any time from work or business-- no need to be in bed a single day.

For since the invention of the Cluthe Truss or Cluthe Automatic Massager, the day of operation is over, save for an occasional case.

The Cluthe Truss has probably effected more permanent cures than all the operations ever performed.

And is always safe, and almost invariably beneficial, whether or not it brings complete cure. (Cure is sometimes impossible, as told in another chapter.)

+Why Ordinary Trusses Do More Harm Than Good+

The country is full of trusses which are nothing but more or less worthless makeshifts. Some with so little merit that they try to hide under other names.

Like the junk handed out at drug-stores. Like the traps peddled by the quacks who pose as Hernia "Specialists."

Trusses and appliances with belts, bands or springs around the waist, trusses with leg-straps, etc.

Some of these trusses cost little more to make than a pair of good suspenders or garters. A little leather, a few pieces of elastic or web band, a cloth-covered pad with sawdust in it, is about all there is to them.

So, like suspenders or garters, they absorb perspiration; that rots them so they soon give out.

But their greatest weakness isn't in their cheap materials; it's in their unscientific construction, in the fact that they usually do more harm than good.

A rubber band around your waist would do as much good as some of these makeshift trusses and "appliances"; and not be so apt to do harm.

Might just as well wear your suspenders or garters over your rupture as some of the trusses and devices with which this country is overrun. Some of these trusses would hold your rupture just about as well if you left them hanging in the closet instead of wearing them.