Constipation in adults and children : with special reference to habitual constipation and its most successful treatment by the mechanical methods / by H. Illoway.

  • Illoway, H. (Henry)
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Constipation in adults and children : with special reference to habitual constipation and its most successful treatment by the mechanical methods / by H. Illoway. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    55/522 (page 35)
    whilst increased oxygenation makes the movements more 'powerful. The gases developed in the intestinal tract, by keeping the bowels moderately distended, greatly facilitate the passage through them, from pylorus to rectum, of the chyme and residuary bolus.^ Defecation. — As can be seen from the configuration of the sigmoid flexure, whether it be of the form described by anatomists generally or it have the shape noted by Treves (upon careful reading of his description and atten- tive inspection of his drawings, it does not require a great stretch of the imagination to see an s romanum [rather a sigma] in the omega), it is evidently intended for the accumulation of faeces; and this is truly its purpose. The fully formed faeces accumulate in the flexure and are held there ready to be discharged. Ac- cording to the description of O'Beirne,^ there is a narrow- ing at the point of junction of the sigmoid flexure and the rectum — O'Beirne's sphincter. But even if this be disputed, it is nevertheless readily understood how the faeces can collect therein. As already stated, the move- ments of the large bowel are very slow, and there is but little vis a tergo. The sigmoid flexure is of large capacity; moreover, lying as it does on the sacrum* and bladder, it is supported, held up, and the faeces kept from falling down. The rectum is always free from faeces, as was stated by O'Beirne, and as I have amply convinced myself. Its walls lie ordinarily in apposition and it thus forms an additional support for the faecal masses gathered 1 See Chapter II. New Views on the Process of Defecation, etc., 1834.