Dr. Conquest's outlines of midwifery : intended as a text-book for students, and a book of reference for junior practitioners.

  • Conquest, Dr.
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Dr. Conquest's outlines of midwifery : intended as a text-book for students, and a book of reference for junior practitioners. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    and, as a general rule, I consider opium contra- indicated in the treatment of these affections. •—■ J. M. W.] OF LABOURS, OR THOSE ATTENDED WITH LACERA- TION OF THE UTERUS OR VAGINA. No occurrence is more sudden, unaccountable, and disastrous than this melancholy catastrophe., After an indefinite time from the commencement of uterine contractions, whilst every circumstance connected with parturition appears to be favourable, a woman may be seized by a most acute abdominal, rather than uterine, pain, very sudden In its accession, and spasmodic in its character, accompanied by too unequivocal sensations of something bursting within the abdomen. This feeling is immediately followed by a cessation of pain; indescribable prostration of the vital powers ; hurried and laborious respiration; feeble, rapid, or intermitting pulse; and vomiting. Sometimes the patient gives one or two deep sighs, becomes extremely restless, gasps, and expires. At other times she gets gradually more feeble, till she dies from internal haemorrhage, after a few hours. Now and then she lives^until destroyed by the slower process of inflammation ; still more rarely, notwith- standing the laceration shall have been so extensive as to permit the child to escape into the cavity of the abdomen, some well-authenticated instances are re- corded, in which it has been extracted pei- vias natu-