Notes of two cases of disease of the ear, with remarks / by James Erskine.

  • James Erskine
Date:
[1885]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Notes of two cases of disease of the ear, with remarks / by James Erskine. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    (3) filling up the wound with finely powdered boracic acid, and covering it with absorbent cotton and a bandage. This treatment was repeated daily for about a month, and after- wards every second or third day. No bad symptoms developed. On the evenings of the days of the operations the temperature was slightly increased. By the end of three months the parts were completely healed, a depressed rectangular cicatrix re- maining at the place of operation. This little patient showed, no trustworthy signs of hearing, and, owing to his extreme youth, the extent of his power of hearing sounds could not be accurately ascertained. A case of such advanced disease as the above occurring in both ears is very seldom met with. Considering the way in which purulent discharges from the ear are neglected or ignored, such cases might be expected to occur oftener. The probable course of the case detailed above may be roughly and briefly described as follows:—After an attack of acute suppurative catarrh of the middle ear, with perforation of the membrana tympani, chronic suppuration sets in, resulting in partial or complete destruction of the tympanic membrane, along with the ossicles; swelling or hypertrophy of the mucous membrane of the tympanum, or formation of granu- lations in this cavity; stenosis of the meatus from thickening of its walls; extension of suppurative catarrh to the antrum mastoideum, which in the child is very large, the rest of the process consisting of cancellous bone; production of periostitis followed by necrosis, as the lower layers of the mucous cover- ing of the mastoid cells act like periosteum; the purulent accumulation which takes place in the mastoid antrum making its way by the outer wall of this cavity through the cortex of the mastoid, forming an abscess externally; whach either is opened by a surgeon, or allowed to burst through the superficial tissues, and forms a fistulous openino- at the situation where it was found in this case. The purulent collection in the mastoid sometimes perforates the posterior wall of the external meatus and escapes thereby; or it may
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