Account of a Caesarean operation through the vagina, successfully performed / by M. Grimme ; communicated by Dr. von Embden.

  • Embden, Dr von.
Date:
[1817]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Account of a Caesarean operation through the vagina, successfully performed / by M. Grimme ; communicated by Dr. von Embden. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    For the London Medical and Physical Journal. Account of a Cesarean Operation through the Vagina, suc- cessfully performed; by M. Grimme, Aulic Surgeon and Man-Midwife at Brunswig. Communicated by Dr. von Embden. IN the night of the 22d of November, 1814, Mr. G. was called to assist the wife of a shoemaker of that place, the midwife having declared it impossible to deliver her. After several strange details the midwife gave of the case, as, for instance, that the whole uterus had prolapsed, that the os tinea; had totally disappeared, that absolutely no part of the child could be felt, and that the patient had felt la- bour-pains sixteen hours already, &c. Mr. G. proceeded to examine, and found the abdomen regularly shaped. The waters had not yet come away, and the movements of the child was plainly perceivable in the upper and right side of the uterus. The woman was twenty-nine years of age, of an ordinary size, and the pelvis well proportioned. On examining the pudenda, however, the left labium was found swelled as big as a man’s head, the right being of the proper size. Irregular flaps, and pieces of flesh, made up the lesser labia; and the whole entrance of the vagina appeared lace- rated, though not sore, all being healed, and shewing only that inflammation and suppuration had once existed in those parts. Of this Mr. G. afterwards actually convinced him- self, being told, that, twelve years ago, after a lying-in in Swedish Pomerania, the patient had laboured a whole year under an affection of these parts, and had actually un- dergone surgical treatment. The clitoris appeared also lacerated, and in the vagina scars were plainly seen ; so that there was every reason to suppose the womb at that time had participated in the inflammation and subsequent suppu- ration, and that the vaginal portion leading to it had been destroyed. A tumour was felt in the upper part of the vagina, occupying the whole upper pelvic aperture, the right vaginal portion lying extended before it, and feeling like an amnion ready to burst. Passing his finger a little beyond that vaulted swelling, backward and to the left, an aperture was discovered like a small grove: this could be nothing but the disfigured remains of an os tincae. This little aperture had hitherto entirely escaped the observation of the midwife, as, during the frequent and violent pains, the examining finger could but with difficulty be carried thither, and during the intervals it could not be reached at *11. In the front ot the fundus vaginae, sevt?rnl uneven spo;s X weru