A treatise on the science and practice of midwifery / By W. S. Playfair.
- William Smoult Playfair
- Date:
- 1885
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A treatise on the science and practice of midwifery / By W. S. Playfair. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.
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![THE SCIENCE AND PRACTICE OF MIDWIFERY. PART I ANAT03IY AND PHYSIOLOGY OF THE ORGANS CONCERNED IN PARTURITION CHAPTER I. ANATOMY OF THE PELVIS. The pelvis is the bony basin situated between the trunk and the lower extremities. To the obstetrician its study is of paramount importance, for it not only contains, in the unimpregnated state, all the organs con- nected with the function of reproduction, but through its cavity the foetus has to pass in the process of parturition. An accurate knowledge, therefore, of its anatomical formation may be said to be the very alpha- bet of obstetrics, without which no one can practise midwifery, either with satisfaction to himself or safety to his patient. In a treatise on obstetrics, however, any detailed account of the purely descriptive anatomy of the pelvis would be out of place. A knowledge of that must be taken for granted, and it is only necessary to refer to those points which have a more or less direct bearing on the study of its obstetrical relations. The pelvis is formed of four bones. On either side are the ossa inno- minata, joined together ])y the sacrum ; to the inferior extremity of tlie sacrum is attached the coccyx, which is, in fact, its continuation. The OS innominafum (Fig. 1) is an irregularly shaped bone originally fjrmed of throe distinct portions, the iliam, the ischium, and the pubes, wliich remain s<;paratcd from each other uj) to and Ixyond the jx'riod of puberty. They an; united at the acetabiiliun by a Y-shaped cartilagi- nous junction, wliich does not, as a rule, hecc^me ossified until about the twentieth year. Tlie conse(jU(!nce is that the pelvis, during the jx'i'iod of growth, is subject to the action of various mechanical influences to a](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2121072x_0041.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
