Plastics and orthopedics : a report republished from the transactions of the Illinois State Medical Society, for 1871 / by David Prince.

  • Prince, David, 1816-1889.
Date:
[1871]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Plastics and orthopedics : a report republished from the transactions of the Illinois State Medical Society, for 1871 / by David Prince. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

    18/72
    may be employed without any disadvantages and with some increased facility of inti'oduction and removal. The avoidance of cutaneous ulceration.—In the use of plastic pins and of sutures that are wide-sj^read and deep, it is found advantageous to protect the cutaneous surface by some means of distributing the pressure, and a disk of lead has been used for the purpose, but some ulceration of the underlying surface has generally been the result. I have noticed that the absorption of the surface of the skin is prevented or diminished by the presence in the paper compress at the extremities of the pins, of the mixture of carbolic acid, glycerine and chloride of zinc* In the operation for entropion, to be noticed further on, in which a silver wire is twisted over a small compress of paper saturated with this antiseptic mixture, there has never been a case of ulceration of subjacent skin. Galvanic action, in case of the metals, may have something to do in producing the ulceration; and in the case of the paper compress, a part of the explanation may be the prevention of the putrefaction of the fluids unavoidably present under the compress, and the consequent irritation. Bibulous paper, or several thicknesses of unglazed paper are cut in small squares from one-third to half an inch in diameter, thus: (See Fig. A.) A small hole is previously punched for Fig- -A- the passage of the needle, unless it is preferred that the exploring needle should make the perfora- tion. One of these paper compresses, saturated with the disinfecting solution is slipped upon an exploring needle, and the needle is made to transfix the parts to be retained in apposition. The plastic pin is then inserted along the groove of the needle; another disk is slipped over the points of the needle and pin; a thread is passed around the heel and point of the pin and needle, as one lies in the groove of the other, and tied across. Another compress prepared in the same way may sometimes be placed over the joining of the wound under the thread, to distribute the pressure of the thread as it passes across the line of incision. After all this, is done the grooved *Take of a solution of carbolic acid 16 grains to the ounce of water—of a solution of chloride of zinc 24 grains to the ounce of water and of glycerine—each equal parts mis.