Obstetric operations : including the treatment of hmorrhage / by Robert Barnes ; with additions, by Benjamin F. Dawson.

  • Robert Barnes
Date:
1870
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Obstetric operations : including the treatment of hmorrhage / by Robert Barnes ; with additions, by Benjamin F. Dawson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

    48/504 (page 34)
    ation of form tlie head undergoes when the English forceps is applied. I can show outlines of heads as strongly altered under the natural forces of labor as thej often are under forceps delivery. Fir. 1. Fig. 1.—The original form of tlie head before being aflfected by labor. [We may prove that the normal foetal head is moulded and compressed during labor in the following manner: After having repeatedly practised forceps delivery upon the cada- ver, we are then to fill the foetal head with plaster of Paris, and, allowing it to become hard, then again attempt to de- liver with the forceps. This we will find almost, if not absolutely, impossible, owing to the acquired incompressible state of the foetal head, and we may even straighten a strong- pair of forceps in our efforts. This happy illustration is made use of by Prof. T. G. Thomas M^hen lecturing to his class in l^ew York on the compressibility of the foetal head.] Secondly. ISTumerous experiments have been made with strong forceps upon dead children, to determine this point.