Series of twelve bone and joint cases : illustrating recent improvement in the mechanical surgery of the lower limb / by Rushton Parker.

Parker, Rushton, 1847-1932.

Date:: 1884

Credit: Series of twelve bone and joint cases : illustrating recent improvement in the mechanical surgery of the lower limb / by Rushton Parker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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$[Medical Times and Gazette, Dec. 29, 1883.] Case 12.—Fracture of Left Femur, with Twist of Lower Fragment, to correct Genu Valgum. Herbert B., aged five, was similarly treated on July 27, 1883, the fracture being made at or slightly below the middle of the bone. A simple and (after the first day) painless recovery was made, with restoration of the proper line of the limb. He was discharged within a month of operation. The case was one of rickety bend of the tibiae, the con- vexity forwards, with genu valgum, pronounced on the left side, but slight on the right. The tibial bends are not a source, apparently, of mechanical inconvenience. When seen on December 14 he was very vigorous, active, and well able to walk and run. There was a very slight degree of double genu valgum, which it is believed he will grow out of with the use of boots having sloping heels, the inner sides being high. He is still under treatment with that object. Remarks.—Among the various forms and degrees of knock- knee, bandy-leg, and other deformities of the lower limbs, there is some scope for selection in the method of treatment. In childhood much can be done with the aid of splint and bandages alone, without operative interference at all, to favour the resumption of proper line by natural growth, as has been well said by Mr. Edmund Owen in the British Medical Journal of February 21, 1880. The force that distorts young limbs is apparently not great when the bones are abnormally soft, or the ligaments weak or over-$