On concussion of the spine : nervous shock and other obscure injuries of the nervous system in their clinical and medico-legal aspects / by John Eric Erichsen.

  • John Eric Erichsen
Date:
1875
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On concussion of the spine : nervous shock and other obscure injuries of the nervous system in their clinical and medico-legal aspects / by John Eric Erichsen. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    or less rigidity of others, becomes as painful for the patient to bear as it is difficult for the surgeon to explain. Hypersesthesia of the most intense character is fre- quently found associated with ansesthesia. In these cases the hypersesthesia extends in a line between the parts that preserve their normal sensibility and those that are ansesthesic. Thus in cases of dorsal injury of the spine, there may be a hypersesthesic zone round the body, with more or less complete ansesthesia of the pelvis and lower limbs. In injury of the cervical spine there may be a hypersesthesic line extending down the arms, the skin on one side of the limb above the line being nor- mally sensitive, that on the other side being com23letely benumbed. This thoracic or abdominal zone round the body, or perpendicular line of hypersesthesia down a limb, corresponds to the distribution of the nerves that are given off from the spinal cord at the seat of injury. This may as a rule be taken as an indication of fracture across the vertebral column, even though there be no disjDlacement of the bones. It is occasioned by the irritation of the nervous trunks by the sharp or ragged edges of the fractured ]3ortions of bones, in their passage through the injured portion of the spine. There is a minor degree of this form of hypersesthesia, consisting of the sensation of a cord tied tightly round the body, which is very common in severe blows, more especially in wrenches of the spine, and which seems to be dependent rather on pressure on the nerves by ligamentous strain than by bony fracture. The follow- ing case which has been under my care at University College Hospital is a good illustration of this form of hypersesthesia :^- Case 16. Injury of the Spi7ie in lower Dorsal Region—