The practice of obstetrics : designed for the use of students and practitioners of medicine / by J. Clifton Edgar.

  • Edgar, J. Clifton (James Clifton), 1859-1939.
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The practice of obstetrics : designed for the use of students and practitioners of medicine / by J. Clifton Edgar. 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.

    17/1098 (page 11)
    This Practice of Obstetrics is founded upon fifteen years' work in maternity hospitals and in bedside and didactic teaching. The cHnical and theoretical material collected from these sources has been rearranged, rewritten, and as far as possible compared with modern authorities. The aim of the present Practice of Obstetrics is to present the subject of midwifery from a practical and clinical standpoint, so that it will best facilitate the requirements of the student of medicine and of the active obstet- rician. To this end the simplest classification has, I believe, been adopted. I have omitted as unnecessary in such a work the elaborate section upon the anatomy of the female genital organs usually found in the works upon obstetrics, and have entered directly upon the physiology of these organs. The omission of the separate section upon anatomy is to avoid repetition, since the anatomy, histological and topographical, of the pelvis and its contents will be found in its appropriate place under the Parts on the Physiology of Pregnancy and Labor. I have divided the work into ten Parts, namely: I. The Physiology of the Female Genital Organs. II. Physiological Pregnancy. III. Pathological Pregnancy. IV, Physiological Labor. V. Pathological Labor. VI. Physio- logical Puerperium. VII. Pathological Puerperium. VIII. The Physiology of the Newly Born. IX. The Pathology of the Newly Born. X. Obstetric Surgery. This classification, elaborated and broadened from year to year, is practi- cally the same that I have followed during the above period in the two depart- ments of teaching. Several innovations will be found in this book. 1. At the beginning of each Part the table of the contents of the part in question has been placed, and to further insure ease of reference each Part is subdivided into sections, each section in turn headed with a sub-table of its subject-matter. 2. The subjects of asepsis and of pelvimetry, including cephalometry, are treated under The Examination of Pregnancy. I believe that this is the proper time and place for the student to be drilled in these subjects. 3. The subject of Deformities and Monstrosities of the Fetus has been entered into more fully than usual under Antenatal Pathology, with 144 illustrations, including all of the common and most of the rarer monstrosities. 4. The illustrations of the mechanism of labor and moulding of the fetal skull in vertex, bregma, brow, face, and pelvic presentation are mostly new, and are arranged as it has been my custom to teach these subjects. The illus- trations of cervical engagement of the presenting part were obtained by palpating with two fingers of the left hand, and at the same time sketching with a soft pencil in the right hand. Inspection of the cervical engagement by the aid of a perineal retractor and reflected light was also used, but this method was less satisfactory than palpation except in the case of face presentation. The illustrations of vulval engagement of the presenting parts are from flash-light