A guide to the practical study of diseases of the eye : with an outline of their medical and operative treatment / by James Dixon.

  • Dixon, James, 1813-1896.
Date:
1859
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A guide to the practical study of diseases of the eye : with an outline of their medical and operative treatment / by James Dixon. 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.

    413/474 (page 381)
    Mr. Chitchett has very recently proposed an opera- tion, which he terms Iriddesis, [Iridodesis ?] as suitable to a limited class of cases; as, for instance, where prolapsus iridis has occurred, and so much of the pupillary margin has been drawn into the cicatrix as to reduce the area of the pupil to a yery minute aperture; or where the whole pupil has been dis- placed towards the extreme edge of the cornea and overshadowed by an opacity. A puncture is made through the cornea, sufficient for the introduction of a cannula-forceps; a small portion of iris near its ciliary attachment is grasped, drawn out through the wound, and tied there with a very fine ligature. This transforms the pupil into a long slit. A second portion of iris is then similarly tied in a suitable position, and the elongated pupil assumes a triangular the basis of A New Method of Operating. It, however, exactly resembles a hook needle invented by Mr. Watson, of Edinburgh, and figured in his Compendium of the Diseases of the Human Eye (third edition, 1830, plate xviii., fig. 18) ; where he speaks of it (p. 431) as a small needle having a portion removed from its side near the point, so as to form a hook. This instrument is intended to be introduced through the cornea, for the purpose of laying hold of, and pulling out a portion of the iris, without previously making an opening in the cornea. In a note, at p. 372, Mr. Watson adds, —The same instrument (only of a larger size), I was much sur- prised to find, since the publication of the last edition of this work, delineated in a tract by Beee, published in 1799, which he used to extract the lens from its capsule, in cases of Cataract. Rather, to extract the capsule after the lens had been removed. Of course Mr. Bowman was no more aware of his operation having been anticipated by Mr. Watson, than the latter was aware of Beee's inventing a needle hook thirty years before the Com- pendium was published.