A memoir on indolent ulcers and their surgical treatment / by John Gay.

  • John Gay
Date:
1855
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A memoir on indolent ulcers and their surgical treatment / by John Gay. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    and often very difficult of cure. As its persistence tends seriously to impair the advantages of this ope- ration, my attention was specially directed to it, for the purpose of ascertaining its cause, as well as the means of its prevention. A case occurred in the Royal Free Hospital, in which such a hole remained after the operation; and after watching it for some time with my intelligent friend, Mr. G. F. Lane, now of Highgate, this gentleman remarked that the hole continued to decrease in size, even after the complete cicatrization of its edge; and it became obvious that it did so, not in consequence of any out-welling of the edge, but at the expense of the laxity of the soft palate generally; for as the hole con- tracted in size, so the soft palate became more and more tense vmtil the closing tendency appeared to cease altogether. The inferences appeared to be as follows; that, for the closing of such an aperture two conditions are re- quired;—1st, freedom on the part of the edge to con- tract; and 2nd, freedom on the part of the palatal flap at large to yield to whatever strain the edge in con- tracting may make upon it;—and that the process of closing cannot go on if either of these conditions be wanting. A little reflection led me to conceive an analogy between the process by which such an aperture closes, and that by which ulcers, or any other breach of sur- face, commonly heal;-and to infer, that the arrest