Clinical report [on cases in the Edinburgh Surgical Hospital] for the summer session 1835 / [James Syme].

  • James Syme
Date:
[1835]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Clinical report [on cases in the Edinburgh Surgical Hospital] for the summer session 1835 / [James Syme]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    12/34 (page 12)
    that might require it. I have accordingly operated six times with perfect success. In relating several of these cases in the foregoing reports, I took occasion to notice the objection which seemed to have prejudiced the profession against the operation, and endeavoured to remove it, as well by explaining that the tendons when divided acquired new attachments to the neigh¬ bouring parts, as by stating the facts that the stump was not rigidly extended, but remained completely flexible under the patient's control ; and that, so far from being useless, it allowed walking and other kinds of progressive motion to be accomplish¬ ed without deformity or lameness. At the meeting of the As¬ sociation for the Promotion of Science in Edinburgh in Sep¬ tember 1834, I showed that a patient who had suffered partial amputation of the foot four years before could walk without per¬ ceptible defect, and move the stump at will. Having thus endeavoured to vindicate the operation from an unjust prejudice, and establish its utility in practice, I read with regret the following report of the proceedings of the Medi¬ cal Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science at the Dublin meeting: “ Mr Whatton (of Manches¬ ter) read a most interesting paper 4 on partial amputations of the foot.' After an admirably drawn up memoir on the former modes practised in France and England, and some strictures on those known as Chopart's and Hey's operations, in which, from the removal of the attachments of the tendons of the principal muscles of the leg, and the aponeuroses covering them, those muscles were rendered completely useless for the purposes of progression ; and though the heel remained, the limb was scarcely so serviceable as a wooden leg. Mr Whatton propos¬ ed and entered into a minute detail of the longitudinal opera¬ tion, which be had been long in the habit of performing ; and as evidence of its complete success, and the advantages attend¬ ing it, he presented to the section a patient on whom he had so operated. The man walked stoutly without even a halt, could stand with ease on the imperfect foot, and seemed to suffer very slight inconvenience from the loss he had sustained, though in this case the three outer toes and metatarsal bones, the third cuneiform and cuboid bones, and a portion of the os calcis wrere removed. Mr Whatton exhibited casts taken from the foot at different periods after the operation, which, at the request of Professor Harrison, he presented to the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. “ Dr Granville expressed his high admiration of the operation so admirably detailed, and proposed a resolution expressive of the particular approbation and thanks of the section, with a re¬ quest, that the author of it would not wait for the formal volume