The Dublin practice of midwifery / By Henry Maunsell.

  • Henry Maunsell
Date:
1834
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Dublin practice of midwifery / By Henry Maunsell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    say that the decidua furnishes the light nutrient soil into which the radicles of the ovum can strike at once, and obtain for it, without difficulty, a sup- ply of nourishing particles sufficient to enable it to elaborate its own system. Later, the decidua assists in the formation of the placenta, in a manner respecting which we shall enquire when speaking of that organ. The membrana decidua, or caduca, as its names import, has but a transitory existence, and is always cast off either along with the ovum, or subsequently to parturition. The time at which the ovum arrives in the w'omb is not exactly defined, and has been dif- ferently estimated by observers: it has not, I believe, been recognised with certainty before three weeks from the time of impregnation.* When first visible, it is simply a vesicle formed by two concentric membranes, between which and within the inner one is contained a small quantity of clear gelatinous fluid. The outer membrane is the chorion. It is, at first, covered with a stratum of flocculent vessels, which strike into the decidua, and are, as it were, the radicles of the ovum. In the later periods of pregnancy, it loses its shaggy appearance, and becomes thin and transparent. It * I have known a perfect ovum to be discharged from the uterus exactly seven weeks after menstruation. The prepar- ation is in the museum of the medical school at Park-street. It contains an embryo and vesicula umbilicalis with amnion and shaggy chorion, and is altogether not larger than a hazel- nut.
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