Waters Metric Table

WLMD ID: arap

American anesthesiologist Ralph M. Waters, M.D. (1883-1979) founded the prestigious post-graduate Department of Anesthesiology at the University of Wisconsin in the 1920s.  An educator, researcher and inventor, he chose New York's Foregger Company to make his apparatus. Foregger worked one-on-one with physicians to custom-build their designs. Around 1924, Foregger made the first cabinet-style anesthesia machine in the country for the personal use of Waters' friend and colleague, Arthur E. Guedel, M.D. (1883-1956). By 1931 Dr. Waters was developing his own cabinet machine. He called upon Foregger to build what became the Waters Metric Anesthesia Table.

On the market by 1933, the original Waters Table was available through 1956. That model was equipped with Foregger's metric flowmeters, which were grouped inside a bottle. Shown here is an example of the second model, offered from the late 1930s through 1959. This model featured Foregger's "outside flowmeters", arranged in a straight row. This machine could administer vapor produced from liquid ether, and the gases oxygen, helium, cyclopropane, ethylene and nitrous oxide. It was also equipped with a sphygmomanometer, and a device called a "water manometer" that limited the pressure at which gases were delivered by the machine.

 

Catalog Record: Waters Metric Table Contact [email protected] for catalog record.