Operation for artifical anus / By J. Mason Warren, M.D.

  • Jonathan Mason Warren
Date:
[1848]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Operation for artifical anus / By J. Mason Warren, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    OPERATION FOR ARTIFICIAL ANUS. BY J. MASON WARREN, M.D. ONE OF THE SURGEONS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL. [From the American Journal of Medical Sciences.] Artificial anus is an affection generally caused by the sloughing of the intestine in strangulated hernia, although occasionally, the re¬ sult of abscess and penetrating wounds. Sometimes a small portion only of the calibre of the intestine is destroyed, the bowel becomes attached to the parietes of the abdomen, and a fistulous opening is the result, usually amenable to the ordinary method of treatment. At other times a whole loop of the bowel sloughs off, and both ends of the intestine unite to the abdominal walls, leaving an opening from which the feces are constantly discharged, and only to be remedied by surgical means. Cases of the latter character are of unusual occurrence, and the means for their strictly scientific treatment by surgical operation, have not, until within a few years, been fully established. The one’ I intend to relate is, I believe, the only instance successfully opera¬ ted upon after the method of Dupuytren, in this part of the country, so far, at least, as my medical experience extends. A patient with this affliction is one that may fully claim the sym¬ pathies of those called upon to administer to, and alleviate human suffering. Generally suspended, in the possession of his mental faculties, between life and death, he is destined, unless relieved, to drag out a miserable existence, an object of disgust to himself and a burden to his friends, or to sink worn out by pain, and the emacia¬ tion produced by deficient nutrition. Great satisfaction must there¬ fore be felt by the surgeon, if he can be the means of relieving so distressing a misfortune. The patient with artificial anus, of whose case I propose to give an account, was sent to me by Dr. Brown, of Nova Scotia, in June, 1847. She was thirty-four years old, the mother of six children, and previous to the occurrence of the present accident, of good con¬ stitution. A small crural hernia had existed on the right side for an