Cases of phlebitis and face presentation : with remarks on the Edinburgh Royal Maternity Hospital / by Charles Bell, M.D.

  • Bell, Charles, M.D.
Date:
[1871]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Cases of phlebitis and face presentation : with remarks on the Edinburgh Royal Maternity Hospital / by Charles Bell, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

    8/12 (page 6)
    complaint. Bowels have been four times moved during the niglit and she is weak in consequence. To have live grains of Dover's powder and four of gray powder, and arrowroot for diet. She rapidly improved, and left the hospital in good health on the 31st December. An Anomalous Case.—Jane Crow, aged 19, a thin, delicate- looking girl, with a very sallow complexion, was delivered of her first child at the full period of gestation on the 1st January, after a comparatively easy labour, the head being in the first position. On the 3d day after her confinement she had a slight rigor, fol- lowed by severe headache, which was relieved after taking a dose of castor-oil. She had no other marked symptom, except that her pulse kept above a hundred, and she spoke in a hurried and unnatural manner. When asked how she was, she always said she was quite well. On the 10th day she got out of bed and went into the convales- cent ward; but she soon became weak, although she made no complaint, and she seemed to have no pain. On the 12th day her left arm became inflamed above the wrist, and she soon became quite incoherent, and she died on the 14th day. The friends would not allow an examination. Face Presentation.—Mrs Cochrane, aged 19, a strong, healthy- looking woman, residing in Blackfriars Wynd, was seized with severe pains on the 12th January, and being at the full period of gestation, she was induced to believe that her labour was coming on, and sent for one of the pupils of the Royal Maternity, who, finding that the pains were spurious, left her, with instruc- tions to send for him when the true pains came on. He did not return until the following evening, when the pains were lingering and ineffectual. He, however, remained with her for some hours, and then sent for one of the house-surgeons, under the impression that it was a breech presentation, and tliat the first stage of labour was completed. But when the house-surgeon arrived he ascertained that the head presented, and that labour had just commenced. The error in diagnosis arose from the womb being much anteverted and the head being felt through its anterior walls, and mistaken for the breech. He gave the patient thirty drops of laudanum, which allayed the spurious pains. True labour-pains did not come on until the evening of the 15th, when it was dis- covered that it was a face presentation, and the forehead soon became impacted in the arch of the pubes, which was narrow and angular like that of the male. Such was the state of matters when I arrived, between five and six o'clock on the morning of the 16th. I immediately recommended tlie application of the forceps; and the patient being put under chloroform and her urine drawn off, the house-surgeon endeavoured to apply them, but without success, I then introduced them, but they slipped—an accident which had never occurred to me before,