The anatomy of the intestinal canal and peritoneum in man.

  • Sir Frederick Treves, 1st Baronet
Date:
1885
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The anatomy of the intestinal canal and peritoneum in man. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    sacrum ; it is entirely invested by a fold of peritoneum called the meso- rectum. The second part extends along the concavity of the sacrum as far as the coccyx, at which point the third part begins, and inclines at once backwards to terminate at the anus. This account is verj^ ancient, and has been handed down from book to book through many generations. The descriptions given of the second and third parts of the rectum (the portions beyond the point of ending of the meso-rectum), I would fully endorse, both as regards the direction and position of the gut, and its relations to the serous membrane. But although I began to investigate these parts with a full belief in the ancient account, I must confess that, in the hundred bodies, I have never seen such a sigmoid flexure, nor such a rectum. I would go so far as to state that the flexure does not occupy the iliac fossa, that its meso-colon does not arise wholly from that fossa, that its course is not that of either the letter S or the letter s, and that the first part of the rectum is not disposed in the manner familiarly described. The segments of gut termed the sigmoid flexure and the first part of the rectum form together a single simple loop that cannot be divided into parts. This loop begins where the descending colon ends, and ends at the commencement of the so-called second piece of the rectum ; at the spot, in fact, where the meso-rectum ceases, opposite about the third piece of the sacrum. This loop, when unfolded, describes a figure that, if it must be compared to a letter, may well be compared to the capital Omega. If at any time new terms should be introduced, it might be well to call all that segment of the bowel between the ending of the descending colon and the ending of the meso-rectum the omega loop, and to limit the term rectum to the short piece of practically straight gut that is now described as the second and third part of the rectum. The length of this sigmoid or omega loop in the foetus has been already mentioned. Its average length in the adult is \']\ inches. The longest loop met with (in a male aged 28) measured 27 inches, and the shortest (in a female aged 70) measured 6 inches only. This latter specimen was of a very exceptional character.