George W. Crile: the pneumatic rubber suit.

Military antishock trousers (MAST) have been used in emergency care for only a little more than a decade. However, the initial report of the medical use of an inflatable compression garment appeared in 1903, when George W. Crile utilized a pneumatic rubber suit to augment the blood pressure of patients undergoing head and neck surgery. Technical difficulties occasionally produced precipitous deflation of the garment, but Crile maintained that the device was otherwise free of adverse effects. Since then, a number of complications have been ascribed to the suit, including reduction of vital capacity, metabolic acidosis, skin necrosis, renal failure, vascular thrombosis, and fascial compartment syndrome. None of these have occurred with sufficient frequency to substantially restrict the use of the suit. The mechanism by which the pneumatic garment produces an elevation in blood pressure-ascribed by Crile to elevation of peripheral resistance-continues to be a subject for research.