An account of some experiments illustrative of the mode of formation of the dissecting aneurisms / by Thomas B. Peacock.

  • Peacock, Thomas B. (Thomas Bevill), 1812-1882.
Date:
[1843]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An account of some experiments illustrative of the mode of formation of the dissecting aneurisms / by Thomas B. Peacock. 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.

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    states that he had frequently repeated the experiment of Nicholls with a similar result. He remarks, if leaving the aorta in its place as well as the viscera near it, a little air or any other fluid be injected by a small hole made artificially between the cellular covering and the subjacent muscular or proper fibrous coat of the artery, the matter injected raises and elevates into a tumour the cellular membrane which closely embraces the artery, without properly destroying its cells, which it fills and distends in a remarkable manner. If the matter injected be capable of coagulating, such as melted wax, and if it be pushed with much force, it is observed that the cellular sheath of the artery is not only raised over it like a tumour, by the impetus of the injection, but the internal cells of that covering are also lacerated, and on examining afterwards the capsule of the artifi- cial tumour, it appears as if it were formed of several layers, rough and irregular internally, smooth and polished externally. The same thing happens if air be pushed with much force, or any liquid substance capable of coagulating within the artery, so that by the excess of the impulsion, the proper or internal mus- cular coats burst at some point of their circumference, in which experiment, as in the first, the cellular sheath of the artery is observed to be raised, after the manner of a tumour in aneuJ rism.^'^: !i'Burns, on the other hand, speaking of experiments per-s formed on the arteries after death, says, we find that they rather militate against the doctrine of aneurism being dependent on the forcing of the blood among the cells of the external cover-* ing of the artery. Take an artery whose internal coats are dis- eased, ossified or cartilaginous for example, and whose external covering is healthy, and inject wax into it, and observe what' happens ; you will see, that at first the injection is confined to the proper canal of the vessel, but that by distending this the internal coats rupture, when immediately the wax penetrates be- tween the cellular coat and the one next it, separating the one from the other to a great extent. The wax is never collected in a circumscribed cyst, as the blood is in aneurism ; on the con- trary, it is diffused over a great extent of the artery, and it even compresses the internal coats, pushing them sometimes so much as almost to obliterate the canal of the vessel. In aneurism, we never find this diff'usion of the blood.'' Such being the different results obtained by emment observers, I have been induced to try the following experiments with the view of ascertaining the effect of injecting fluids into the vessels. In the first three experiments the fluid was mjected between the external and middle coats. f)jj;^.u ^ ilj io tl-)H'i nI 1 Scarpa on Aneurisms, translated by Wishart, 1808, p. 70. 2 Burns on Diseases of the Heart, p. 211, 1809.