On that peculiar deformity of the pelvis originally described by Professor Fr. Ch. Nægelè of Heidelberg as the "pelvis obliqué ovata" / by Edward B. Sinclair.

  • Sinclair, Edward B. (Edward Burrowes), Sir, 1824-1882
Date:
1855
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On that peculiar deformity of the pelvis originally described by Professor Fr. Ch. Nægelè of Heidelberg as the "pelvis obliqué ovata" / by Edward B. Sinclair. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    causes, viz.,—from disease, congenital, or in early life; from arrest of development; and from circumstances of a mechanical nature, combined with those of constitutional defect. We find, however, that sufficient evidence does not, as yet, exist, to enable us to attach to any of them, individually or collec¬ tively, the cause of this abnormal deviation, for reasons which are, doubtless, well known to every obstetrician. With regard, then, to this part of the subject, it only remains to inquire,— whether, in the case I have just narrated, there are any points from which we may derive information relative to the question at issue ? It will be remembered that previous and subsequent to the death of this woman, an old cicatrix was observed in a region nearly over the top of the right sacro-iliac synchondrosis; and that, after death, the structures in the neighbourhood of the articulation, both posteriorly, laterally, and externally, were found in such a state as to lead us to conclude that a diseased action, which necessarily was once connected with the forma¬ tion of the old cicatrix, was in a similar manner connected with those altered structures. But, be this as it may, we find evi¬ dence of the former presence of long-continued and extensive disease, in close contiguity to an anchylosed joint, there being over the line of fusion a sharp and prominent ridge, showing a more than natural deposition of bony matter atone time, “ and not the merest eminence,” as Naegele has described; added to which, there was an apparent loss of substance of a very spongy bone which helps to form the altered articulation. Now all these circumstances lead at least to a presumption that the right sacro-iliac synchondrosis, in this particular case, was the subject of disease, and that the fusion of the sacrum with the ilium of the right side was not merely a simple congenital an¬ chylosis, subsequent to arrest of development, but one resulting from the healing of some inflammatory action of the articula¬ tion, and that not before ulceration had destroyed the inter- articular cartilages, and caries had consumed a considerable por¬ tion of one of the bones (the one most likely so to be attacked), composing the same articulation. The history of this case, still further followed up, has cer¬ tainly the effect of confirming the above idea. I gained some information relative to the patient from her mother, who evinced the greatest anxiety that a post-mortem examination should be instituted; but I ought to mention that I had never any interview with the latter until after the death of the former.
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