An exposition of the signs and symptoms of pregnancy : the period of human gestation, and the signs of delivery / By W.F. Montgomery.

  • Montgomery, W. F. (William Fetherston Haugh), 1797-1859.
Date:
1839
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An exposition of the signs and symptoms of pregnancy : the period of human gestation, and the signs of delivery / By W.F. Montgomery. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Lamar Soutter Library, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Lamar Soutter Library at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

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    suspected and Tiedemann1 has proved, impart to it a more exalted degree of sensibility, which from their close connection with the great abdominal plexuses is quickly diffused throughout the system at large, which is soon found to participate in the excitement emanating from the uterus:2 there is felt a sensation of feverish uneasiness, chills alternating with flushes of heat, sick stomach, disturbed sleep, languor, and sometimes drowsiness; menstruation is suppressed, and the breasts soon begin to evince an active sym- pathy, becoming swollen and sensitive; the pulse is generally quickened, especially at first, the blood exhibits modified characters of inflammation, and venesection is found the most effectual means of relief in many of the most urgent affections of pregnancy, even in constitutions, says Den man,3 which at other times do not well bear that evacuation:—all of which, it may be observed, appear the natural, and no doubt salutary consequences of the plastic activity prevailing in the great organ of reproduction at the time. In consequence of this increase of vital action imparted to it, the uterus acquires a principle of growth which steadily proceeds, until, instead of being an insignificant organ buried deep amongst the contents of the pelvis, it attains to dimensions of such magnitude, and undergoes changes in its component structures so remarkable, that, whether considered absolutely or relatively, they present to our observation a series of phenomena at once the most extraordinary and beautiful of any that claim our admiration in the arrangements of the animal economy: surely the enthusiasm of Swammerdam is not to be censured as excessive when he described it as the miracu- lum naturcB. The virgin uterus is about 2£ inches long, If broad, and about an inch from back to front, with a cavity which would not more than receive into it the kernel of an almond. According to the calculations of Levret, its superficies may be taken at 16 inches, but at the end of the ninth month of gestation its length is from 12 to 14 inches, its breadth from 9 to 10, and from back to front from 8 to 9 inches : its superficies is now estimated at about 339 inches, and its cavity, which before impregnation was equiva- lent to about \}, or quam proxime fths of a cubic inch, will now contain 408, so that its capacity is increased a little more than 519 times, and its solid substance from 4^ to 51 cubic inches, or nearly in the ratio of 12 to 1; and at the same time a similar increase of size is observed in its several constituents ; for instance, bloodvessels which before conception would not have admitted the point of a probe will now readily receive the end of our finger, and yet let but a few weeks elapse after parturition, and the organ has again resumed its original contracted and diminutive state. But, as we might anticipate, such expansion of an organ so situated must involve many changes affecting other parts also, and as it acquires this 1 Tiedemann, Tabulae et Nervorum Uteri Descriptio, p. 10. * Lobstein compare l'uterus d'une femme grosse a un organe attaque d'une inflammation lente et chronique.—Desormeaux. 8 Introduction, p. 220.