Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Outlines of human pathology / by Herbert Mayo. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.
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![During three days, the only change which ensues is the absorption of some of the extravasated blood. The ecchy- mosis at the completion of this period is paler than at first. The blood effused does not contribute to the re- union of the broken bone. When there is much extra- vasation, the restorative process, instead of being accele- rated, is retarded; the fracture does not stiffen as early as otherwise. 2. The second period extends from the fourth to the tenth or twelfth day. Under ordinary circumstances, on the fourth day a change supervenes, which bears some resemblance to inflammation. The parts adjacent to the fracture become more vascular, and are infiltrated with a gelatinous lymph. The same substance is diffused, as an adhesive glue, around and between the fractured extremi- ties. Sometimes the matter so effused is gelatinous; at other times it has the common appearance of coagulable lymph. The effusion produces a sensible thickening around the fracture. The motion at the fracture is less free. Con- solidation appears to have begun. But as yet the change is limited to a general infiltration of the parts adjacent to the fracture : all the textures so situated appear involved in this infiltration: it may be conjectured, however, that the filamentous tissue is its more especial seat. [c. 1*.] 3. The third period extends from the tenth or twelfth day to the twentieth or twenty-first. The general tumefac- tion of the soft parts adjoining the fracture now subsides: the different textures become again distinct. They appear gra- dually to disengage themselves from the diffused thickening in which they were at first involved; so that they are eventually disposed on the outside of a circumscribed and dense mass or capsule, which immediately contains the broken ends of the bone : that mass is termed the provi- sional callus. It is of a whitish colour, and has the firmness and elasticity of cartilage, of which nature no doubt it is. The parts which were involved in the first general thick- ening are not indeed as yet so completely extricated from it, but that the nerves and tendons often lie in grooves, or b 2](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21958518_0037.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
