Who was the first British surgeon to wear surgical gloves?

• A. William Halsted
• B. Gustav Neuber
• C. Berkeley Moyniham
• D. Charles Chamberland

Answer: (C)

The idea being tested is how surgical gloves moved from novelty to a standard part of operating rooms, as surgeons began to adopt protection against infection and irritation in the late 19th century. William Halsted in the United States set the precedent by using gloves during operations after gloves were made for his scrub nurse, Caroline Hampton, to protect her hands from dermatitis and to reduce infection. In Britain, the surgeon who first adopted this practice and helped popularize gloves in British surgery was Berkeley Moynihan. He followed Halsted’s lead and wore gloves during operations, helping to establish glove use as a normal part of surgical technique in Britain. The other figures listed were not the first to introduce gloves in Britain (or were associated with different fields), so Moynihan is the best answer in this context.