Elements of operative surgery / translated from the French of A. Tavernier ; with copious notes and additions by S.D. Gross.

  • Tavernier, A. (Alphonse), -1850. Manuel de thérapeutique chirurgicale. English
Date:
1829
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Elements of operative surgery / translated from the French of A. Tavernier ; with copious notes and additions by S.D. Gross. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

    9/483
    may be cured, or relieved. Experience has long shown, that the use of internal remedies is not only required in a large pro- portion of the diseases, which are regarded as strictly chirurgi- cal, but also, that there are few diseases which come under the care of the physician, in which morbid affections, requir- ing the manual aid, or practical skill of the surgeon, do not fre- quently occur. The treatment of febrile and internal inflammatory dis- eases, it will be allowed, belongs exclusively to the province of the physician wherever the distinction between physician and surgeon has been introduced, and is rigidly observed; yet in some species of fevers, and in all internal inflammatory dis- eases, blood-letting is often the principal, if not the only, reme- dy that is required. But this is an operation, however urgent the necessity for it be, which from engagement the physician can not, and, from the fear of degrading his province of the pro- fession, will not perform. Retention of urine not unfrequent- ly takes place in symptomatic febrile diseases, and this is an affection which does not always yield to the use of internal re- medies; but it is an affection also, from the painful uneasiness which it immediately excites, as well as from the danger which it threatens, that will not admit of delay. When internal re- medies, therefore, fail in relieving the patient, the urine must be speedily drawn off by means of a chirurgical operation: otherwise inflammation, mortification, and rupture of the blad- der, must necessarily ensue. Febrile and internal inflamma- tory affections terminate not unfrequently in the formation of fluids, which it is necessary to let out by a chirurgical operation; and abscesses, fistulous openings, and ulcers are formed, which require the aid of the surgeon. In patients, also, affected with severe febrile diseases, from being long fixed down to their beds in one position, some of the parts of the body, upon which they rest, occasionally acquire a disposition to mortify, larger or smaller portions of the skin and subjacent cellular membrane becoming dead, separate from the living parts; and sores are formed, which are but too often the subject of unavailing chi- rurgical practice. To employ, in the different stages of this species of mortification, from its first commencement to the complete separation of the dead parts, and the formation of a new skin, the appropriate external and internal remedies, re- quires a greater share of chirurgical skill than can reasonably be expected in those who make a profession solely of physic. Un- happy, therefore, must be the lot of that patient, who in cir- cumstances similar to those which I have described, has the misfortune to have for his sole medical attendant a physician ignorant of surgery. But, continues Professor Thomson, if a knowledge of surgery be necessary to the student who intends to practise physic, the knowledge of physic, on the other hand, is no less necessary to him who intends to devote his attention exclu- sively to the profession of surgery; for, indeed, there are few
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3