Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy for Gas Gangrene

To the Editor: True clostridial myonecrosis, one of several causes of "gas gangrene," is a potentially fatal disease that affects approximately 1000 persons in the United States annually. 1 Dr. Gorbach and his colleagues 2 gave a misleading estimate of the mortality of this disease and omi...

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Published inThe New England journal of medicine Vol. 302; no. 16; pp. 920 - 921
Main Authors Poulton, Thomas J, Spaccavento, Leo J, Ruxer, Robert L, Lohr, David C
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States Massachusetts Medical Society 17.04.1980
Subjects
Gas Gangrene - therapy
Humans
Hyperbaric Oxygenation
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Summary:To the Editor: True clostridial myonecrosis, one of several causes of "gas gangrene," is a potentially fatal disease that affects approximately 1000 persons in the United States annually. 1 Dr. Gorbach and his colleagues 2 gave a misleading estimate of the mortality of this disease and omitted discussion of a therapy that might have saved their patient. I disagree strongly with the contention that radical amputation was the patient's "only chance" for survival. In 1960, Boerema and Brummelkamp 3 first proposed hyperbaric oxygen therapy as a treatment for gas gangrene. Since gas gangrene is rare and often fatal, an adequate clinical evaluation of . . . No extract is available for articles shorter than 400 words.
Bibliography:SourceType-Other Sources-1
content type line 63
ObjectType-Correspondence-1
ISSN:0028-4793
1533-4406
DOI:10.1056/NEJM198004173021615