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Warren Commission Hearings: Vol. III - Page 371« Previous | Next »

(Testimony of Dr. Malcolm Perry)

Mr. Specter.
And is Dr. McClelland occupying a similar position at Parkland Memorial Hospital. as Dr. Baxter?
Mr. Specter.
Would you identify Dr. Jenkins?
Dr. PERRY. Dr. M. T. Jenkins is professor and chairman of the department of anesthesiology and chief of the anesthesia service, and Dr. Giesecke is assistant professor of anesthesiology at Parkland.
Mr. Specter.
Have you now identified all of the medical personnel whom you can recollect who were present at the time the aid was being rendered to the President?
Dr. PERRY. No, sir; several other people entered the room. I recall seeing Dr. Bashour who is an associate professor of medicine and chief of the cardiology section at Parkland.
Dr. Don W. Seldin, who is professor and chairman of the department of medicine, and I previously mentioned Dr. Paul Peters, assistant professor of urology, and I believe that Dr. Jackie Hunt of the department of anesthesiology was also there, and there were other people, I cannot identify them, several nurses and several others.
Mr. Specter.
Dr. William Kemp Clark arrived at about that time?
Dr. PERRY. Dr. Clark's arrival was first noted to me after the completion of the tracheotomy, and at this point, the cardiotachyscope had been attached to Mr. Kennedy to detect any electrical activity and although I did not note any, being occupied, it was related to me there was initially evidence of a spontaneous electrical activity in the President's heart.
However, at the completion of the tracheotomy and the institution of the sealed tube drainage of the chest, Dr. Clark and I began external cardiac massage. This was monitored by Dr. Jenkins and Dr. Giesecke who informed us we were obtaining a satisfactory carotid pulse in the neck, and someone whose name I do not know at this time, said they could also feel a femoral pulse in the leg. We continued external cardiac massage, I continued it as Dr. Clark examined the head wound and observed the cardiotachyscope. The exact time interval that this took I cannot tell you. I continued it until Dr. Jenkins and Dr. Clark informed me there was no activity at all, in the cardiotachyscope and that there had been no neurological or muscular response to our resuscitative effort at all and that the wound which the President sustained of his head was a mortal wound, and at that point we determined that he had expired and we abandoned efforts of resuscitation.
Mr. Specter.
Would you identify Dr. Clark's specialty for the record, please?
Dr. PERRY. Dr. Clark is professor and chairman of the department of neurosurgery at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School, and chief of the neurosurgical services at Parkland Hospital.
Mr. Specter.
Now, you described a condition in the right mediastinum. Would you elaborate on what your views were of the condition at the time you were rendering this treatment?
Dr. PERRY. The condition of this area?
Mr. Specter.
Yes, sir.
Dr. PERRY. There was both blood, free blood and air in the right superior mediastinum. That is the space that is located between the lungs and the heart at that level.
As I noted, I did not see any underlying injury of the pleura, the coverings of the lungs or of the lungs themselves. But in the presence of this large amount of blood in this area, one would be unable to detect small injuries to the underlying structures. The air was indicated by the fact that there was some frothing of this blood present, bubbling which could have been due to the tracheal injury or an underlying injury to the lung.
Since the morbidity attendant upon insertion of an anterior chest tube for sealed drainage is negligible and the morbidity which attends a pneumothorax is considerable, I elected to have the chest tube put in place because we were giving him positive pressure oxygen and the possibility of inducing a tension on pneumothorax would be quite high in such instances.
Mr. Specter.
What is pneumothorax?
Dr. PERRY. Hemothorax would be blood in the free chest cavity and pneumothorax
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