The surgical treatment of fibroid tumors of the uterus / by John Homans.

  • John Homans
Date:
1895
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The surgical treatment of fibroid tumors of the uterus / by John Homans. 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 success which sometimes attends this procedure. I have seen a fibroid the size of a cricket-ball entirely disappear at the end of four weeks after removal of the ovaries and tubes, and I have seen some continue to grow, and one to be extruded from the os uteri two years after removal of the ovaries and tubes, the tumor having become a large polypoid growth, and the woman had lost her ovaries unnecessarily two years before. I think we may dismiss this plan of treating fibroids by removal of the ovaries and tubes as uncertain and unreliable. As I have said before, it does not seem necessary to enumerate all the sur- geons who have contributed to the literature of the treatment of fibroid tumors. In the United States Martin, Dudley, Gordon, Baer, Baldy, Byford, Kelley, Edebohls, Polk, Price, Krug and others have reported excellent work and intelligent practical measures. In Germany, besides Schroeder, Hager, Kaltenbach and many others have written on this subject. The method which I have gradually, and independently, come to use is nearly like the operation called the Schroeder-Hoffmeier method, but it removes more of the uterus and is more simple in the application of the sutures. So far as I am concerned, it is the out- come of my work and experience during the past thirteen years, and I am satisfied with it, though I hope to improve upon it. There are four principal methods of removiug the tumor and treating the pedicle. I he intra-peritoneal, first described by Schroeder; the extra-peritoneal, Koeberle and Peau; complete removal of all uterine tissue, first, I think, described by Eastman; and the method of vaginal fixation described by Byford. The method of treating these tumors by ligature of the uterine arteries from the vagina, recently proposed by Franklin H. Martin, must not be omitted, and bids