Observations on the histology of fracture repair in man / by J. Greig Smith.

  • Smith, J. Greig, 1834-1897.
Date:
[1882]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the histology of fracture repair in man / by J. Greig Smith. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    in a few days from shock or other complications, are excluded from the list. Such cases, though they have their value as illustrating the very first changes common to all fractures, are of little use towards the study of special features of bone repair. A few specimens of fracture of from three to five days' standing (three of ribs, one of humerus, one of thigh, two of radius, and ^ one of spine) were examined, with special reference to the amount and condition of the effused blood. These presented no peculiar features, and need not be more particularly referred to. The cases which were fully studied, and from which the material for the following paper was chiefly drawn, must be separately described. They were— 1. A museum preparation, injected, of a simple fracture of the femur of a child a year old. This preparation had been mounted for some years in spirit, with simply the soft tissues removed. When bisected longitudinally it proved to be a beautiful speci- men, showing ensheathing and intermediate callus in the most perfect manner. There was scarcely any displacement, and the ensheathing callus, of spongy porous bone with its trabecule arranged perpendicularly to the surface of the shaft, was of a regular ovoid shape. The intermediate callus was only partially infiltrated with bone salts. The specimen is a typical one of the normal mode of repair as seen in fractures in the lower animals, and fully bears out Sir J. Paget's supposition that in fractures of long bones in young children the process of repair is very like that described from the experiments on animals. Half the section was used up for microscopic study, but the soft tissues, from prolonged soaking in spirit, were not in good preservation. 2. An oblique fracture of the tibia, extending into the ankle joint, in a man aged thirty-six, who died on the ninth day of delirium tremens. There was double comminution of the frag- ments, and the periosteum was completely torn through, except over a portion of the smallest fragment. The fissures were filled with blood-clot in various stages of transformation. The speci- men was valuable also as showing an early stage of periosteal inflammation, and the first beginnings of calcification in the powerful ligament which unites the lower extremities of the tibia and fibula. For this specimen I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr Pickering, house surgeon to the Bristol General Hospital.
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