On Artificial Dilatation of the OS and Cervix Uteri by Fluid Pressure from Above

On Artificial Dilatation of the OS and Cervix Uteri by Fluid Pressure from Above is a medical paper by Horatio Robinson Storer (1830-1922), the American obstetrician and gynecologist whose large career produced both important technical contributions to gynecological surgery and sizable public advocacy on reproductive medical and legal questions.

Storer was a pioneering American gynecologist whose work helped establish the specialty within American medical practice in the mid nineteenth century. His technical papers addressed specific surgical procedures and clinical problems that the developing specialty was working to standardize. The artificial dilatation paper addresses a particular obstetric technique used in clinical situations requiring opening of the cervix.

The paper is of interest now primarily to historians of nineteenth century American gynecology and obstetrics. Storer’s broader career also included his major public role in the physicians’ crusade against abortion that produced the various American state criminalization laws of the 1860s and 1870s.