Finally, the provocative study elicited a series of personal anecdotes from the audience, including a surgeon who used antibiotics to successfully treat an attorney who refused appendectomy because he was arguing a case before the Supreme Court the next day. A Canadian surgeon told the story of Patrick Roy, a star goalie who was successfully managed with antibiotics during a Stanley Cup match, prompting fellow Canadians to demand the nonoperative treatment for their appendicitis. The situation got so out of hand that the Quebec Association of Surgeons issued a statement that antibiotics are not appropriate treatment for all cases of appendicitis.
Yet before the conversation could sway the crowd too far from its surgical roots, an attendee reminded the audience that they were sitting just a few miles from Detroit’s Grace Hospital, where Harry Houdini died in 1926 as a result of peritonitis secondary to a ruptured appendix (albeit before the advent of antibiotics).
The authors disclosed no relevant conflicts of interest.