A surgical handbook : for the use of students, practitioners, house-surgeons, and dressers / by Francis M. Caird and Charles W. Cathcart.

  • Caird, Francis Mitchell, 1853-1926
Date:
1889
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A surgical handbook : for the use of students, practitioners, house-surgeons, and dressers / by Francis M. Caird and Charles W. Cathcart. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    riASTER-CASriNG. 230 liy means of the ]ilaster make it slick to the skin all round the most prominent part of the hand, and at the tips of the fingers if extended. Now, rapidly cover over the whole of the rest of the hand as before. The thread will remain in its position, unless disturbed. When the plaster has thickened to the consistence of cream-cheese, ilraw the thread stgadily out through it all round. If the right state of the plaster has lieen chosen, the track ol the thread should remain open. Should the plaster be too soft, it will fall in on the thread's track ; should it be too firm, it will crack and break rather than let the thread come through. Do ni t Kiuch the mould otherwise until it has set. By cautiously inserting a knife into the track of the thread at various parts, the top of the mould may be lifted off, and the hand withdrawn from the lower half. The foot is a little more difficult to manage. Two threads must be taken whose tracks overlap, and each of which must be drawn out only until it meets the track of the other. One loop of thread passes below the sole and up the leg over the malleoli, the end^ Ijeing held at first above and parallel with the axis of the leg. The other parallel with the long axis of the foot passes round the back of the heel, and coming round the sides of the foot at its most jirominent part, crosses in front of the great toe, where the ends hang forward. Having covered the foot with plaster, the caster must heap up the plaster on the ankle and lower part of the leg' while it is soft enough to mould itself to the skin, yet firm enough not to run down when placed in position. The threads are to be drawn out as l^efore—in this case from above, and from the front until their tracks cross, below the malleoli. The two pieces of the mould thus mapped out are, one covering the front of the leg anil dorsum of the foot, and the other covering the back of the leg anfi sole of the foot. (3) Making the Cast.—The chief points requiring attention are. how to prevent the cast from sticking to the mould, and how to obviate air bubbles in the cast. Freshly-made plaster, if poured into a mould which has not been specially prepared, will assuredly stick to it. The simplest and best way to prepare the mould is to soak it in water for an hour or two before it is needed. To test for sufficient soaking, watch, after tiie mould is taken from the basin, whether water remains on the plaster, or dries in. If the latter, the pores of the plaster are evidently not yet filled with water, and further soaking is needed. If the mould be quite soaked, the fresh plaster will lie in the most perlect contact with every detail of its surface without uniting to it. In addition to thorough wetting, the surface may be painted over with olive oil or be dashed over with soap-suds, and then again with pure water (olive oil painted over the surface of a dry mould is almost at once sucked in and becomes useless, unless by many repeated coats the plaster is filled with it. Boiled linseed oil after two or three coats will form a varnish on the surface, but it is apt to impair the sharpness of the cast, unless care is taken to limit the amount).