A practical treatise on the diseases of the eye / by William Mackenzie ; to which is prefixed an anatomical introduction explanatory of a horizontal section of the human eyeball by Thomas Wharton Jones.

Date:
1840
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A practical treatise on the diseases of the eye / by William Mackenzie ; to which is prefixed an anatomical introduction explanatory of a horizontal section of the human eyeball by Thomas Wharton Jones. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    mortal, yet, in some rare cases, the ball, or other foreign body, has been known to remain within the cranium for a length of time, without producing much disturbance. Case 43.—Petit related in his lectures, the case of a soldier, who received a musket-shot in the inner angle of the eye. It seemed a very simple wound, ami healed under the common hospital treatment. The man thinking himself cured, determined to leave the hospital, although advised by the surgeon to remain some time longer. Scarce had he reached the door, when he was seized with rigors, obliged to return, and died in two days. On dissection, the bjill was found lodged under the sella Turcica and optic foramina. An abscess was present in the brain. Case 44.—Dr Ilennen mentions^^ the case of a French soldier, wounded at Waterloo. ITie ball entered the right eye; the left, though not in the slightest d^ee injured to appearanee, became completely blind. Dr II. felt under the zygoma, and all along the neighbourhood of the wound, but in the puffy state of the parts could not detect the course of the ball. The ])atient himself was con- fident it had gone into his brain. He returned to France convalescent. The following case of a gun-breech penetrating the cranium through the orbit, and remaining in the brain for two months, occurred to Mr VValdon of Great Torrington, Devon, and was communicated by Mr Abernethy to the Medical Society of London: Case 45.—A lad of 19 years of age, about 5 o’clock in the afternoon, as he was shooting at a wood-dove, was knocked down in consequence of the burslingj^ of the gun. No person being with him at the time, the first effects of the injury could not be ascertained; he was probably soon deprived of sensation and power by the accident, as he remained in the wood till the afternoon of the following day, comprising a space of 22 hours, during a very severe frost, and was found about sixty paces from the spot where the accident hapj)cncd. On Mr Waldon’s arrival, he found the patient in his perfect senses, notwithstanding the os frontis and the dura mater had been perforated a little on the right side and above the frontal sinus, and a considerable quantity of cerebrum wiis then upon his clothe*, and exuding from the wound. From considering the nature of the injury, and the manner in which it had been inflicted, Mr Waldou concluded that only the breech, as it is called, which screws into the back jiart of the barrel of the gun, could have effected the mischief. On the gun being found, his conclusion w as verified, the barrel being perfect, and the breech gone, having carried with it the whole of the wooden j)urt of tlie stock on a plane with itself. Notwithstand- ing the patient being at this time sensible, Mr Waldon still doubted, from the forefe with which the breech must have been dislodged from the barrel, to over- come the resistance of the os frontis and dura mater, whether it might not 1« within the cavity of the cranium. In the most gentle manner possible, he intro- duced his finger as far as he judged prudent, in order to detect whether any extraneous body was lodged there or not, but w ithout effect. The patient having lost a considerable quantity of blooil, as apneared on examining the spot where he lay the preceding night, Mr Waldon judged it not expedient to open a vein, but contented himself, for that night, with wrapping the upi)er ])art of the face in a warm poultice, giving a laxative mixture, and ordering a strict antiphlogistic regimen. Next morning, to his inexpressible surprise, he was informed that the lad had passed a good night, retained his senses, and was in good spirits. On removing the cataplasm, he found that an immense discharge of bloody fluid had exuded from the cavity of the cranium. This continued for several days to be thrown out, to the quantity of at least a j)int every 24 hours, by the pulsa- tory motion of the arteries. On re- moving, at the first dressing, some part of the cataplasm from the internal can- thus of the left eye, Mr W’aldon dis- covered by the probe, the head of one of the screw pins, {,Fig. 1.) which fasten the lock to the stock, almos