Observations on obstetric auscultation : with an analysis of the evidences of pregnancy, and an inquiry into the proofs of the life and death of the ftus in utero.

Kennedy, Evory, 1806?-1886. [from old catalog].

Date:: 1843

Credit: Observations on obstetric auscultation : with an analysis of the evidences of pregnancy, and an inquiry into the proofs of the life and death of the ftus in utero. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Lamar Soutter Library, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Lamar Soutter Library at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

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$child ; depending, perhaps, upon the movement of the h3^datids upon one another during the change of position of the individual. Littre even states that a peculiar sound {bruit seniblable au gazoaellement) has been ob- served in these cases. The ut3rus generally acts to ex- pel the hydatids about the third or fourth month after their formation; but they occasionally remain much longer, in some cases even to the sixth or ninth month ; more or less hemorrhage usually precedes and accompanies their discharge. We have known the hemorrhage sometimes continue for several days, or even weeks, before their expulsion, and occasionally to be so violent and protracted as to be attended with much danger to the patient, and require manual interference to effect the removal of the hydatids, and to excite the contraction of the uterus. Although the menses may be strictly said to cease in almost all cases of uterine hydatids, yet a watery flu d, somewhat tinged with blood, is often observed to be dis- charged from the vagina at irregular intervals during ihs progress of their growth: this has, no doubt, been mis- taken for a menstruous discharge. A quantity of watery fluid is sometimes collected in the uterine cavity ; but this is a disease so seldom met with in practice, that we do not seem to be in possession of certain knowledge of its true nature, so as to be able to pronounce whether it is merely a modification of hy- datid growth, tl]e uterus containing, as it were, one large hydatid, or whether it is, hke other dropsical effusions, a secretion from its inner surface. It is only when occurring unconnected with pregnancy that this watery collection in the uterus is rare, an inordinate quantity being not unfre- quently met with when the ovum becomes blighted, par- ticularly in syphihtic constitutions. The enlargement of$