Mask for Surgeons

The gauze mask worn by generations of doctors and nurses slows down the spray of germs from their breathing, but eventually lets a dangerous proportion get through. Last week two Minneapolis surgeons described a radically new mask that allows only a small fraction of the germ spread and should markedly reduce the number of infections in surgical wounds.

Designed by Surgeons Claude R. Hitchcock and Joseph Kiser of Minneapolis General Hospital, the mask is made of flexible polyvinyl plastic. Inside it is a disposable filter of cotton and cellulose. In this trap the surgeon's breath is both dried and filtered; the exhaled air escapes backward from the mask's wings, is almost germfree. The new mask, built to stand away from the skin, is cooler than the close-fitting, clammy gauze. And although the plastic part costs $1.50, it should save hospitals money in the long run because it can be sterilized and reused for years. The filter inserts cost only 1-c-, as against 18-c- for the throwaway gauze masks.

Importance of germ filtration in the operating room has become more acute with the relatively greater prevalence of staphylococci that are resistant to penicillin and other antibiotics. Because of constant exposure, it is doctors and nurses who are most likely to be carriers of these potentially deadly germs even though they show no sign of illness themselves.

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