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Of all the modern conveniences we should be most grateful for, anesthesia is almost definitely the most important advance in human history. Can you imagine going to surgery with little more than a bottle of whiskey? Neither do I. In addition to the excruciating pain that must have accompanied it, there was also the very real possibility of dying from the shock induced by the immense pain of a surgical procedure.

For thousands of years, humans have used all kinds of methods to desensitize pain during surgical procedures, including alcohol, opium, or fumes from a cloth soaked in an anesthetic.

These are some of the most important figures in the history of anesthesia:

Joseph Priestley (1733-1804)

The English scientist Joseph Priestley (1733-1804) lived in the Age of Enlightenment, when all kinds of progressive ideas were developing. Among his many contributions to science and other fields was that he discovered nitrous oxide. But Priestley never got into the practical uses of the compounds.

Humphry Davy (1791-1867)

While it was Joseph Priestley who first discovered nitrous oxide, it was British chemist Humphry Davy who began experimenting with the effects of inhaling the chemical compound. He noticed how the nitrous oxide made him want to laugh, and he finally got his nickname, laughing gas.

Horace Wells (1815-1848)

Davy’s discoveries were largely ignored until dentist Horace Wells took up their cause. The Connecticut dentist began experimenting with nitrous oxide, using it as an anesthetic during dental surgery. He may have created a setback for his cause when he attempted a public demonstration of anesthesia, and his dental patient was not fully anesthetized and screamed in pain. But Wells also used the method to extract one of his own teeth and claimed to have felt no pain.

Crawford Long (1815-1878)

The first use of diethyl ether as an anesthetic has been attributed to the American physician Crawford Long. Long, an American physician and pharmacist, first used ether on March 30, 1842 to remove a tumor from a patient’s neck.

Perhaps the most interesting part of his story is how Long discovered the pain-suppressing properties of ether. It was during one of the many popular “aether games” where members of high society inhaled gases such as sulfuric ether for the euphoria it caused. For a long time, he witnessed a participant suffer a serious fall, but showed no ill effects from the spill. This prompted Long to conduct more studies on the apparent pain-relieving properties of ether.

William Thomas Green Morton (1819-1868)

While others have used ether as an anesthetic before Morton, it was he who first publicly demonstrated the use of inhaled ether as a surgical anesthetic in 1846. Since the use of ether was not publicized by other physicians, including Crawford Long, Morton he was initially credited as the first to use ether as an anesthetic.

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