The after-treatment of cases of abdominal section / by Christopher Martin.

  • Martin, Christopher
Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The after-treatment of cases of abdominal section / by Christopher Martin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    has recovered without a comphcation, she may sit up in bed for an hour on the fourteenth day, and get out of bed for an hour on the fifteenth day. By about the twenty-first day she will be able to go out for a drive, or even to leave home. Fmal Instructions to the Patient.—She must be advised as to the regulation of her diet and the management of her bowels— taking if necessary some mild aperient, such as compound liquorice powder. She must be warned to avoid all muscular exertion, such as lifting heavy weights or running up-stairs. For three months at least the marital relations must be suspended. Most important of all, she must be urged to continue the use of the belt for two years after the operation. Certain signs and symptoms have a special significance in abdominal surgery. They are primary colours, so to speak, variously combined in the several clinical pictures. A brief separate notice of the more important may not be out of place. PAIN. This varies remarkably in different cases, and is by no means proportionate to the severity of the operation. The removal of a simple uncomplicated ovarian cyst may be followed by marked suffering. In another case, desperate adhesions to intestines, liver, and uterus have to be torn through ; large areas of raw intestine have to be seared with the cautery; the pelvis has to be sponged out with perchloride of iron to arrest bleeding; and yet the patient makes an admirable recovery, scarcely suffering a twinge. Freedom from pain does not mean safety: she may be in dire peril from haemorrhage or peritonitis. Nor must we forget the personal equation. The farmer's wife, a fat, phlegmatic, honest woman, who has lived a wholesome life, suffers litde and makes no complaint; whilst the pampered invalid, thin, anaemic, and neurotic, who has ruined her ner- vous system with morphia and chloral, tosses in agony. This leads me to the question of morphia. To one who is not a morphia habitud, a single hypodermic injection, given immediately after the operation, is beneficial. It mercifully
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