Second memoir on excision of the knee-joint : to which is appended a remarkable example of the power of operative surgery in saving the same articulation / by Richard G.H. Butcher.

  • Butcher, Richard G. H., 1819-1891.
Date:
1857
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Second memoir on excision of the knee-joint : to which is appended a remarkable example of the power of operative surgery in saving the same articulation / by Richard G.H. Butcher. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    u At the expiration of six weeks the bones were anchylosed, and I have no doubt his case will be perfectly successful.” How truly we find this prediction verified by the report given of the case in the Lancet, September 13, 1856, wherein it is stated:—“ He now walks and runs without the slightest diffi¬ culty;” and I have received from Mr. Holt, on October 1, 1856, the following reply in answer to my inquiry:—“The little boy to whom you refer has continued to walk and run without difficulty since I last wrote to you; he is fat, and in excellent health.” The fourth case—that operated on by Mr. Statham—has been very tedious, and slow in recovery. I frequently soli¬ cited information relative to it, but to no purpose. However, 1 have been referred by Mr. Smith to the last account of it in a public record, a small work—Gunshot Fractures and Re¬ sections—wherein it is stated, p. 117:—“March 14, 1856: Is found lying in bed, but gets up six hours a day, and gets about with the aid of a chair; joint is quite healed, not tender, but stiff; no matter escapes, and there is no pain.” The fifth case was under the care of Mr. Henry Smith—a boy aged six years—and operated on October 18, 1854, and tabulated as “rapidly recovering.” Mr. Smith gives the full details of this case in an able papera, already referred to, and from which I make the following extract:— “ April 15th. For the last month the patient has been walk¬ ing about the streets every day, after having been furnished with a boot having a sole two inches higher than the other; and by means of a crutch and stick his powers of progression are very free, lie plants the limb, which is very firm, well down upon the ground; and, with the assistance of a stick alone, he can walk with the utmost facility ; but when he goes out for any distance, I have desired that he should use a crutch as well, as a mere precautionary measure, especially as the boy, being proud of his leg, is very fond of showing his agility, by the performance of the most eccentric movements, which are more calculated to amuse others than to enhance the utility of his limb. On very careful admeasurement of the two limbs, I find that the limb operated on is two inches and one quarter shorter than the other. It is straight, and not bowed out. On using some force above and below the site of operation, a little amount of movement, before backwards, can be produced ; but in the lateral direction this is hardly detectible. In all pro¬ bability the junction between the bones is partly fibrous, partly a Medical Times and Gazette, May 2G, 1855. B 2