A manual of minor surgery and bandaging : for the use of house-surgeons, dressers and junior practitioners / by Christopher Heath.

  • Christopher Heath
Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A manual of minor surgery and bandaging : for the use of house-surgeons, dressers and junior practitioners / by Christopher Heath. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    thumbs are then to be placed against tlie glaus, and made to compress it in the same way, after which endeavours should be made to draw the foreskin forwards, and at the same time to push the glans in with the thumbs. After a few minutes' steady traction the parts will assume their proper position, unless the foreskin has become ulcerated and its sui'faces agglutinated together. Water dressing should afterwards be applied around the penis, whicli must be supported by a bandage. A few punctures on the swollen prepuce, and the application of a piece of elastic webbing or india- rubber band tightly round the part for a few minutes, will be found to tend greatly to remove the swelling : and in cases where the congestion of the organ rather than the amount of oedema is the cause of difficulty in effecting reduction, the application of a stream of cold water from an ordinary tap for a quarter of an hour will much facilitate the proceeding. Appearances closely resembling paraphimosis are sometimes caused by a child having tied a thread round the penis, either in play, or with the view of obviating punishment for wetting his bed. In these cases the thread becomes so embedded in the swollen tissues as to I'equire great care for its discovery and division. Strangulated hernia.^lt is the exception rather than the rule for patients to apply at a hospital ostensibly for relief of a strangulated hernia. Having, probably, never been warned upon the subject, they re(^ard the rupture as of secondary importance, and apply for relief of the constipation, pain, or sickness consequent upon strangulation. In all cases, there- fore, of pain in the abdomen with constipation, it is well'to direct attention to the possible existence of a rupture, since the patient seldom or never volunteers the information. If there is the slightest sus].icioii in the house-surgeon's mind, notlnng but actual