On the form, construction and use of a cataract needle, of a particular description / employed by Arthur Jacob.

  • Jacob, Arthur, 1790-1874.
Date:
[1827]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the form, construction and use of a cataract needle, of a particular description / employed by Arthur Jacob. 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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    The strongest argument in favour of this,ope- ration is, that it is the most easily perform- ed, affording a valuable resource to the sur- geon, who, unpractised in extraction, wishes, to avoid the evil consequences of depression. Ano- ther argument scarcely inferior in weight to the last, is, that the injury inflicted on the organ is much slighter than in extraction, where so ex- tensive a wound of the cornea is made, or in de- pression, where the vitreous humor is necessarily lacerated, and the retina frequently injured. If the objections to depression be well founded, re- course must be had to this operation in those the contact of the aqueous humor by opening the capsule; and doubly indebted to Mr. Saunders for establishing by repeated operations the value of the suggestion. Attempts have lately been made to transfer the credit of this improvement to others Mr. Guthrie first gives the merit to an old lady, cotemporary with Theodore Mayerne, and then, with more reason, to Paul Barbette : but as the works of these authors have not been republished since 1690, and as the copies extant are not of fre- quent occurrence, it must be allowed that it is probable they were not plundered by Mr. Pott and Mr. Saunders. Frick, an Ame- rican writer, attributes the improvement to Gleize, who himself actually gives Mr. Pott the credit of the discovery. Among other technical terms in ophthalmic surgery introduced from Germany, we have that of Keratonyxis applied to this operation generally, although it can have reference to the anterior operation only; and with the word, we have the claim of Dr. Buckhorn to the anterior operation, which English surgeons have been practising for nearly twenty years at the suggestion of Mr. Saunders, and this on the grounds that Dr Buckhorn, published an inaugural Dissertation on the subject in 1806.