The History of Cesarean Section

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The History of Cesarean Section

Cesarean Section is defined as the delivery of a baby by surgery. To perform this procedure, a doctor makes an incision in the mother's belly and uterus. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, one in three babies is born by this type of surgery. However, this was not always the case. C-sections have progressed greatly over the years with advances in medicine and with the shear advancements of how we think.

Origins of the name Cesarean Section

C-sections have been a part of human culture since ancient times and there are stories regarding this procedure in both western and non-western cultures. One of the earliest origins of the name cesarean comes from the story of Julius Caesar's birth. It was believed that Julius Caesar was derived from a surgical birth. This story seems to be unlikely though because his mother is said to have lived until Caesar's invasion of Britain, and in those times a woman who went under this procedure was likely to have died. A more likely origin of the name was Roman law under Caesar, which said that all women who passed away in childbirth must be cut open, therefore cesarean.( Boley)

Although we are not entirely sure where the term came from, C-sections can be dated back to the 16th and 17th century and was known as a cesarean operation. The initial purpose of the procedure was to either retrieve the infant from a dead or dying mother to try and save the infant (which was used during Caesar's time to increase his population), or it was used in religious situations to bury the infant separately from the mother.

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First Recordings of Cesarean Section

The first written record of a mother and baby surviving comes from Switzerland in the year 1500. A man by the name of Jacob Nufer performed the operation on his wife.

After several days in labor and help from midwives, she was unable to deliver the baby. Jacob gained permission from the local authorities to attempt at caesarean section on his wife. The mother and the baby both lived and his wife went on to give birth to five more children.(Boley) This was the scene for many of the earliest successful c-sections; remote rural areas lacking medical staff and facilities. These operations took place on kitchen tables and beds, which was probably an advantage until the 19th century. It was an advantage because surgery in hospitals was just asking for infections as infections passed very easily through patients. The first ever recorded C-section in the British Empire was conducted by a woman, which was very rare because few women were even allowed in medical school. James Miranda Stuart Barry performed the operation while disguised as a man and serving in the British Army. During the 19th century when Barry performed this operation, many travelers reported seeing this procedure in indigenous people of Africa.(Miller) Many of the first recordings are stories like these in remote parts of Europe and places far removed from western medicine. It was only until an increase in urbanization that C-sections started being routinely practiced.

Medicine and a new area of Surgery

It was during the 19th century that surgery was transformed into what is more common today. A new era began in 1846 when a Massachusetts dentist, William Morton, used diethyl ether while removing a facial tumor. This new technique quickly spread to

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Europe. It began receiving criticism there because of the biblical teachings in Europe. It wasn't until Queen Victoria of England used chloroform for the births of two of her children that it became broadly accepted. This use of anesthetics enables surgeons to take more time on their surgeries, thus resulting surgeons to record details, clean the incisions, and most importantly, learn from their experiences.(Young) Anesthesia allowed doctors to replace a very common procedure, craniotomy with C-section. Craniotomy has been practiced for hundreds of years and involved the destruction of the fetal skull and the piecemeal extraction of the entire fetus from the vagina. Before the advances from anesthesia the process, although gruesome, was far less of a risk than an abdominal incision (C-section). Once anesthesia, antiseptics, and asepsis were firmly established, obstetricians were able to concentrate on improving techniques in C-sections. As the C-section process became safer, doctors did not believe in delaying surgery. Rather than having a woman go through many hours of unsuccessful labor, doctors opted for surgery. Many doctors thought that if a woman was not in a state of collapse when taken