Epoch-making books in British surgery. I, "A system of surgery" by Master John Arderne / by Sir D'Arcy Power, K.B.E., F.S.A.
- D'Arcy Power
- Date:
- 1927
Licence: In copyright
Credit: Epoch-making books in British surgery. I, "A system of surgery" by Master John Arderne / by Sir D'Arcy Power, K.B.E., F.S.A. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![He says, describing a ease of facial paralysis, that “it is a kind of cramp which turneth the mouth of a man or woman down to the ear in the manner of a fish called a flounder. Note well, if the crookedness of the mouth endure for six months it shall never be cured Incidentally he seems to have seen several cases of diphtheria, for he begs his readers to “ note this diligently that in quinsy and in all swellings of the throat and neck and in all difficulty of swallowing, as when the patient may not be able to swallow meat or drink, I have seen many die thereof within five days through strangling There is a clear description of intestinal obstruction under the name of passio iliaca. “ It cometh with constipation of the belly and busy easting [vomiting] and with huge acheing as though the guts were being bored with a wymball [gimlet]. And it hath this difference from Colic, for in Iliac there is more ache and more wallowing now on the right side and now on the left side, and it sooner slayeth through its torment than doth the Colic. And in the Iliac the ache is most from the navel upwards, and the matter that should pass out beneath-forth cometh out of the mouth and in other cases there happeneth many cursed sicknesses as hiccoughing, the cramp, and cold¬ ness and stinking of all the body. And all these be mortal signs if they be with continual vomiting ”. As regards colic it is possible to distinguish renal colic from colic of the bowels because in renal colie “ the sorrow of the reynes is felt whilst going to and fro ”, i.e., when walking or riding. Arderne distinguishes between inflammation of the kidney and a botch or abscess of the kidney, and between a botch of the kidney and a botch of the bladder. Botch of the bladder leads him to speak of strangury, and strangury of the chaudepisse or “ burning of the urine ”, i.e., gonorrhoea, with which he was familiar and treated with mucilaginous injections. He also gives details of a case of soft sores which had been unsatisfactorily treated by “ a lady ” before the patient applied to Arderne. Dysuria is classified into the eases “when the urine is utterly denied ”, i.e., suppression, which “ is a sign of death within seven days”, and “ difficulty of pissing ” or retention. A stone impacted in the urethra “ causeth the patient to suffer right great pain and intolerable sorrow. It may be pushed back into the bladder by an instrument of silver or latten such as may be made in every good town by Craftsmen that maketh pins for women’s heads or at the goldsmiths. Many a one have I so holpen. I have seen young men and old in the which the stones have been so great that they could neither come out by the eye of the yard nor be pushed back but always abideth in the middle of the yard. And I cured them easily and quickly in this manner : First, I took the patient and laid him grovelling and then I bound the yard on both sides of the stone with linen bands, so that the stone might nowhere flee away, and with a little incision upon the stone with a lancet or with a razor I had out the stone, and after that I sewed the outer skin over the hole with a needle and thread, and then I laid on a dressing of white of an egg mixed with finely ground wheaten flour and left it for three days, and within fifteen days I had him perfectly cured ”. There is an interesting sidelight upon the chivalrous period in which the System was written. A modern writer identifies his patients by giving their](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b30801175_0008.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
