HOUSE CALLS

 Anyone remember the days when doctors made house calls?   It was common in small town America before the 1960's.    Doctor Henning (not sure about the spelling of his name) was our family doctor in the small farming town of Willows in northern California.   He always had a suit on when he came to the house and carried his black bag of medical instruments.  The one instrument that always stood out in our memories was his glass syringe and the needle that he would attach to it.   It looked so long.  There were no disposal needles and syringes in those days.  After use they were sterilized for the next unlucky young child dreading the doctor coming to their house.   With six siblings in the house, usually when one of us got sick others became ill shortly thereafter, so the doctor was well prepared with a few other sterilized needles and syringes.  

After taking our temperature, looking down our throats' and listening with a stethoscope, he would say a shot of penicillin was required.    We would look on in horror as he would attached that needle to the syringe, then fill it from a vile and usually give us a shot in the rear.    We would imagine the needle hitting a bone as he pushed it into us as our parents tried to give comfort during the procedure.   Afterwards we were so happy to see the doctor leave.

Doctor Henning had a small one room office on the ground floor of the Willows Hotel.    My mother made an appointment for me once when she discovered a growth on my chest that was bleeding.   When I entered his office he took a look at it and said he needed to cut it off and have it sent to a lab for an examination.   He took a scalpel and cut it off, then placed a bandage over the would.   Later we were told it was a collection of blood vessels that formed outside my body.  The growth never returned as I hoped the doctor would not return to our house in the future.