Q 01/05

Which power tool began as a 1780s Scottish surgical saw for widening the pelvis in childbirth?

A) Jigsaw

B) Band saw

C) Chainsaw

D) Circular saw

Answer · why

C) Chainsaw

The chainsaw began as a fine serrated chain held between two wooden handles. A German doctor's bone-cutting version of 1830 was in effect a miniature ...

Q 02/05

Which Founding Father designed a flexible catheter in 1752 for a brother with bladder stones?

A) Benjamin Franklin

B) Thomas Jefferson

C) Benjamin Rush

D) Alexander Hamilton

Answer · why

A) Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin built the tube from hinged metal segments so that it would bend. He credited an earlier inventor, Francesco Roncelli-Pardino, with h...

Q 03/05

Which wounded US president did Alexander Graham Bell scan for a bullet with an early metal detector?

A) William McKinley

B) James Garfield

C) Abraham Lincoln

D) Theodore Roosevelt

Answer · why

B) James Garfield

James Garfield lay on a bed with metal coil springs, which confused Bell's induction balance. The search of July 1881 failed and the bullet stayed hid...

Q 04/05

Which execution device names the instrument that was standard for removing tonsils for eighty years?

A) Gallows

B) Breaking wheel

C) Garrote

D) Guillotine

Answer · why

D) Guillotine

The guillotine for tonsils was adapted in 1828 by physician Philip Syng Physick from a tool built to remove the uvula. It was later renamed the tonsil...

Q 05/05

Which Stone Age tool material, flaked finer than any metal edge, is still used for surgical blades?

A) Flint

B) Obsidian

C) Quartzite

D) Chert

Answer · why

B) Obsidian

Obsidian is volcanic glass, and a well-made blade's cutting edge is only about three nanometers thick. US regulators have not approved it for use on p...