Table 3. Transcript of Dr. O’Neill’s July 11^th 1889 medical journal entry: Brain Operation.

Brain Operation
Preparation:
1. Where practicable, low diet for a week before hand,  2. Early breakfast,  3. Head to be shaved.
Wash the head with
1. Soap and water,  2. Ether (to remove oil),  3. Turpentine (to remove sebaceous matter,  4. Spirit to remove ether and turpentine,  5. Germicide (carbolic, boracic, or bichloride mercury).
The French trephine is preferable to the English one. Drainage tubes may be either ordinary India-rubber ones, or recalcified chicken bones. Be sure to remove all pus from the wound. Be sure that the deeper parts of the wounds are drawn together. The bone removed is to be washed in a germicide; broken up with a mallet and chisel into smaller pieces (about half the size of a split pea) and carefully replaced on the Dura matter. Dressing Iodoform or Boracic acid powder Put on enough dressing to last for one, two, or three weeks, and leave undisturbed as long as possible. Treatment:
Keep the head high, and cool (illegible and ice-cap)  Exclude light and noise.  Keep movements regular.
Diet: milk, beef tea, and chicken soup. Bad symptoms:
1. High temperature   2. Pain in the head   3. Rigors   4. Fits   5. Vomiting.
When any of these occur, take off the dressing and examine again. A surgeon must be very careful how he gives a certificate that there is no danger to life in a head wound, however apparently slight. What appears a scalp wound may be a fractured skull, Erysipelas too may ensue. He should never certify before 2 weeks and seldom before four. Every head case should be considered as serious, few should be looked on as hopeless.