Mr. Specter.

of that. He only asked about the emergency measures I had taken and I related them to him as I have to you.

Mr. Specter.

Subsequently, did an article appear about you in the Saturday Evening Post?
Dr. PERRY. It did.

Mr. Specter.

Would you outline briefly the circumstances surrounding the appearance of that article as you felt them to be?
Dr. PERRY. We were contacted, not I directly but Dr. Shires, by the medical editor of the Saturday Evening Post, this was all related to me by Dr. Shires, in regard to a possible story. This was declined, since Dr. Shires and those of us in the department felt that the news value was gone and this was commercialism, and they told Dr. Shires, I am told, that they would not print anything.
However, an article appearing under a New York Herald Tribune uncopyrighted by-line apparently was subsequently acquired by them and published.

Mr. Specter.

And was that article accurate, inaccurate, or what was the level of accuracy of the contents thereof?
Dr. PERRY. The level of accuracy was not very good at all. It was overly dramatic, garish and in poor taste, and ethically damaging to me.

Mr. Specter.

In what way was it ethically damaging to you, Dr. Perry?
Dr. PERRY. As you know, it is our policy that the physician's name in the treatment of any patient be essentially kept quiet. There are unusual circumstances surrounding this one, of course, and our names were made public.

But this mentions my name freely, published a photograph that apparently was taken of me at the press conference and had previously appeared in a newspaper, and a picture of the emergency room, trauma room No. 1, and although most of the people in the medical profession, I have subsequently been assured by the Society of Surgeons and AMA, that they realize I had no part in it, which is obvious to them because of the gross inaccuracies. Nonetheless it is harmful to me as a member of the faculty of the medical school to have such an article in print.

Mr. Specter.

Dr. Perry, did you have occasion to discuss your observations with Comdr. James J. Humes of the Bethesda Naval Hospital?
Dr. PERRY. Yes, sir; I did.

Mr. Specter.

When did that conversation occur?
Dr. PERRY. My knowledge as to the exact accuracy of it is obviously in doubt. I was under the initial impression that I talked to him on Friday, but I understand it was on Saturday. I didn't recall exactly when.

Mr. Specter.

Do you have an independent recollection at this moment as to whether it was on Friday or Saturday?
Dr. PERRY. No, sir; I have thought about it again and the events surrounding that weekend were very kaleidoscopic, and I talked with Dr. Humes on two occasions, separated by a very short interval of, I think it was, 30 minutes or an hour or so, it could have been a little longer.

Mr. Specter.

What was the medium of your conversation?
Dr. PERRY. Over the telephone.

Mr. Specter.

Did he identify himself to you as Dr. Humes of Bethesda?
Dr. PERRY. He did.

Mr. Specter.

Would you state as specifically as you can recollect the conversation that you first had with him?
Dr. PERRY. He advised me that he could not discuss with me the findings of necropsy, that he had a few questions he would like to clarify. The initial phone call was in relation to my doing a tracheotomy. Since I had made the incision directly through the wound in the neck, it made it difficult for them to ascertain the exact nature of this wound. Of course, that did not occur to me at the time. I did what appeared to me to be medically expedient. And when I informed him that there was a wound there and I suspected an underlying

wound of the trachea and even perhaps of the great vessels he advised me that he thought this action was correct and he said he could not relate to me any of the other findings.

Mr. Specter.

Would you relate to me in lay language what necropsy is?
Dr. PERRY. Autopsy, postmortem examination.