The surgical anatomy of the groin, the femoral, and popliteal regions / by Thomas Morton ... illustrated with lithographic plates and wood engravings.

  • Morton, Thomas, 1813-1849.
Date:
1839
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The surgical anatomy of the groin, the femoral, and popliteal regions / by Thomas Morton ... illustrated with lithographic plates and wood engravings. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

    98/170 (page 154)
    BUBOES. of the saphena vein, which alone will frequently he sufficient to indicate the origin of the affection. In persons of a scrofulous habit of body the inguinal glands may enlarge and suppurate ■without any other obvious cause than some violent exertion of the limb. All buboes, as soon as suppuration is fairly established, should be freely opened by a neat incision, which should be made to extend through the whole length of the tumour in the direction of its longest diameter. There are, however, some cases in which it is better to employ, for the purpose of opening a bubo, a finely pointed pencil of the potassa fusa ; for example, some of the buboes which occur in scrofulous persons, or in individuals pos- sessing a hemorrhagic diathesis, in whom it would be extremely dangerous to employ the knife.'j' When the sore resulting from the opening of a bubo does not heal, but remains indolent, and its edges are high and callous, much benefit will frequently result from the use of well-applied pressure by means of a compress and the spica bandage ; but if, on the contrary, the edges be thin and undermined, and of a purplish colour, they should be either freely incised at several points, so as to allow of their retraction upon the parts under- neath,—removed with the knife,—or destroyed by the application of the potassa fusa. When a large indurated gland remains in the centre of the sore, and interferes with the due progress of cicatrisation, it should be destroyed by repeated applications of the caustic potash, as its removal with the knife may be fol- lowed by very unpleasant hemorrhage, which may prove exceed- ingly difficult to control, since a ligature cannot always be made to hold upon the bleeding vessel, the coats of which, being softened by the previous disease, readily give way when the knot is drawn. A small hernial sac, it must also be recollected, may lie close underneath an enlarged gland, and might be laid open were the tumour to be cut away with the knife. £ f A man of the name of Ploughwright was admitted about a month since into University College Hospital, under the care of Mr. Liston, on account of a large bubo in the left groin, which was opened in this manner with the caustic potash; for it was deemed dangerous to employ the knife, as he had several times nearly lost his life by hemorrhage from the most trivial wounds. I M. Velpeau recites a case of this kind, in which death ensued from the injury done to the intestine that was contained in the sac. Vide Nouveaux