Repair of a Pitching Arm

By World Series time, the coldness and discomfort that New York Yankee Southpaw Whitey Ford had often felt in his left hand became a strength-robbing cramp afflicting his whole arm. But not until after the second game when he even had trouble shaving did Ford seek medical help from Dr. Martin L. Schulman of Long Island Jewish Hospital. The diagnosis: Pitcher Ford had an apparently complete blockage of the axillary artery, which carries blood through the shoulder toward the fingertips.

The artery had become blocked, possibly by fatty deposits, under the shoul der, where muscle and bone crowd it. Ford's well-developed muscles and his pitching profession aggravated the block: every time he threw a pitch, his muscles and bones would pinch the artery, constricting the vessel even as it was straining to allow blood to pass through. The most promising therapy would be removal of the sympathetic nerves that control the contraction of smooth muscle in the arterial walls.

Ford chose to have the operation done by famed Cardiovascular Surgeon Denton A. Cooley at Houston's St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital. Last week, with Schulman assisting, Cooley made a 51-in. incision under Ford's left armpit into the chest. The surgeon then separated Ford's ribs, and collapsed a portion of lung to expose a chain of nerves running along the backbone like a string of far-apart beads. About four inches of the nerves were removed, and the incision closed. The entire operation took barely 90 minutes.

Next day a beaming Ford met with Houston-resident Johnny Keane, the new Yankee manager. "I brushed my teeth," said Ford, "and I think in a couple of days I'll shave." The operation, said Dr. Cooley, was a success. "The removal of these nerves permits blood to flow through collateral channels to supply the muscles of the arm itself, and causes no interference with muscular power or sensation in his arm."

The only odd thing Ford will notice now is that his left hand will not perspire because the missing nerves controlled the sweat glands; it will feel warmer than his right hand because blood vessels will be dilated. The main axillary artery blockage cannot be cleared up by drugs, and if Ford's cramps return next year, about the only thing left will be surgery to bypass the blocked artery with a piece of his own vein or a Dacron tube. But by week's end Dr. Cooley was a relieved optimist: "Now I know how the surgeon felt who operated on Caruso's vocal cords."

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