I’m a little concerned about mine, and it got me to wondering - why on earth did every kid in America in days of yore have their tonsils out? Why was that standard practice? Isn’t it usual now to just give antibiotics for infection?
Also, was this the case in other places as well? Is there not a tonsil to be found among Japanese people my mom’s age? Australians? South Africans?
They didn’t used to take everyone’s tonsils out. Pepper Mill is my age, and still has hers.
My sister and I, however, don’t have ours. Back in our day it was common to excise the tonsils rather than trying to save them – I don’t know why. Maybe antibiotics weren’t as reliable and selective then.
It was routine in the UK in the 1950s as well. Tonsils were whipped out at the first sign of infection. I think it was standard medical practice worldwide. I have no idea why.
After have strep throat once or twice a year for most of my childhood, they finally removed my tonsils and I haven’t had it since. That was somewhere around 1981 or so.
I’m glad they did it. Strep throat wasn’t fun.
I can’t answer your question. But, if it is of any interest, there was at least some skepticism about the routine removal of tonsils in 1925, when Sinclair Lewis wrote Arrowsmith:
I know this is fiction, but Lewis probably wasn’t the only person in 1925 thinking, “You know, maybe this is kind of a scam.” Whether that sketicism was reasonable or not, I have no idea. According to Wikipedia, Lewis wrote the novel with the assistance of science writer Dr. Paul de Kruif (who received 25% of the royalties on sales). So, my guess is that de Kruif probably shared some of Lewis’ cynicism as well.
A cynical guess would be that it’s related to the shift from traditional health insurance, which rewarded physicians for expensive treatments, to HMOs, which reward physicians for withholding expensive treatments.
I have nothing to back this up but cynicism and guesswork.
Quick, lazy search, using Wikipedia yields:
And this choice result:
Boo! I had the same problem in the LATE 80s and they left mine in!
In general, people began to think that, just perhaps, a part of the body people came equipped with from birth actually had a purpose. The tonsils and adenoids were considered vestigial and useless in the 50s and 60s, so no one saw any reason not to remove them. There were enough cases of it working – reducing the severity of colds afterwards – that doctors and parents were happy.
In some cases, tonsillitis could affect breathing so that an operation wasn’t a bad idea.
Later, it was discovered that the tonsils were part of the lymphatic system and getting infected was just part of their doing their job.
I was at the age where tonsils were removed routinely, and I had tonsillitis enough so that they were considering a tonsillectomy, but eventually we decided not to bother, and I didn’t have much problem with it after that point. If they had been removed, that would have “confirmed” the operation had an effect.
I was disappointed at the time. Most kids were: they liked the idea of getting all the free ice cream they could eat (the standard menu item post op).
I had mine out when I was about 8. Something about recurring sore throats. I don’t remember much of it, and I seem to have suffered no ill effects.
Now, my appendix bursting two weeks after Ivyboy was born…that was an event.
http://www.postbulletin.com/newsmanager/templates/localnews_story.asp?z=10&a=325504
Procedure now is apparently only to do tonsillectomies for chronic tonsillitis – you have to get it at least 4 or at least seven times a year (depending upon the authority you consult). Or if it’s indicated by some other condition, such as sleep apnea.
I don’t recall my case being chronic – I got tonsillitis once, and had them out. At least, that’s what I recall. I was pretty young when I had them iout.
My recollection is that back in the old days it was observed that kids of a certain age got a lot of sore throats, but that after they had their tonsils out this stopped happening, ergo the tonsillectomy cured them. However, nobody had actually done the clinical trial to prove it. Turned out that most of the time after a certain age kids stopped getting as many sore throats anyway. WE know correlation does not equal causation, but apparently lots of folks back in the day didn’t.
These days it’s not done unless there’s a clear need for it, as in swollen tonsils blocking airways or some other condition mandates it. I don’t think it has anything to do with HMOs or other insurance. Neither of my children had the operation and they were of the appropriate age before we had an HMO.
I had my tonsils out back in 1965. I was in the hospital for almost a week because there were complications of some sort, I don’t remember exactly what. But yeah, I ate all the ice cream I could!
It was routine. The part somebody upthread mentioned that tonsils are now thought to help fight harmful bacteria/viruses was unknown back then. There were guidelines, though – you had to have chronic sore throats/ear infections/whatever else x times within x period of time to be considered for a tonsillectomy. Since I had the first two with alarming regularity as a little kid, I was a shoo-in.
I remember they saved my tonsils in a glass jar for me to take home. They were the size of tennis balls :eek:
I just had surgery for obstructive sleep apnea, and my ENT told me that it was “too bad” that I came through a few years after tonsil removal was popular because it most likely would have saved me years of sleep apnea.
Through the years of infections, my tonsils were enlarged and almost useless, serving only to obstruct my airway during sleep…
My son fell into the chronic category. He had 5 or 6 strep throats in a 12 month period. Out went the tonsils - no strep throat since then (18 months).
I was having severe infections and eventually the tonsils were removed. My four siblings never had them out. We all had the measles though, which was good for a week and a half off school with all the nasty sores.
When I was growing up in the '50s, it was pretty standard whenever a kid had too many colds. My brother had his out, and I was scheduled. But I got sick just before I was supposed to be operated on, and my mother decided that was a sign that I shouldn’t have them out. I rarely got sick again (I was far from chronic then) and I still have them.
My wife has hers. The first operation her aunt, who was a nurse, assisted in was a tonsilectomy for an adult who died on the table.
When my kids were growing up tubes in the ears were the hot thing. My oldest daughter got lots of earaches, which cleared right up after the tubes got inserted. Her friends had a lot more tubes than tonsilectomys.