The Chainsaw Was First Invented for Use as a Surgical Instrument for Childbirth

Yes, you read that right. A chainsaw was used to help deliver babies.

The modern chainsaw we as know it was not invented to cut trees. It was designed and developed to cut women’s pubic bones in half during childbirth to make the birthing space wider for the baby to get out of the womb. And yes, it was a grisly as it sounds.

Between the years 1783 and 1785, two Scottish doctors, John Aitken and James Jeffray, invented a “flexible saw” that included a chain with serrated teeth. This medical device would be the first iteration of a modern chainsaw. They published their invention with a description of a pelviotomy or symphysiotomy procedure in Principles of Midwifery, or Puerperal Medicine in 1785.

What is a symphysiotomy?

Back in the 14th century, a French doctor called Severin Pineau got his hands on the corpse of a hanged pregnant woman. He cut her open to learn more about pregnancy’s anatomy, and he discovered something called a “diastasis symphysis pubis,” which is medical talk for a separated pelvic bone. According to the U.S. National Library of Medicine National Institutes for Health, some form of diastasis symphysis pubis occurs in one in four women. In pregnancy, however, it can be seen in 1 in 300 or 1 in 30,000 pregnant people, depending on various factors.

Diastasis symphysis pubis happens during natural vaginal childbirth when the pubic bones, which are typically joined at the center, can dislocate and separate. Some think this happens after the use of forceps or other trauma during childbirth.

The medical chainsaw was used by Aitken and Jaffray when a baby was stuck. They would use the device to cut the pubic symphysis, thus separating the pubic bones and allowing them to open the hips enough for the baby to enter the birthing canal and be born.

The recovery was brutally painful, and women were confined to a hammock-style bed and unable to move while their bodies healed. It should be noted that as horrifying and archaic as this procedure may sound, doctors did use anesthetics before the surgery and pain killers during post-op.

Eventually, obstetrics would advance enough that modern cesarean sections would replace symphysiotomy. The symphysiotomy is no longer performed in first-world countries today, thanks…