Note on the epitrochleo-anconeus or anconeus sextus (Gruber) / by John C. Galton.

  • Galton, John Charles.
Date:
[1875?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Note on the epitrochleo-anconeus or anconeus sextus (Gruber) / by John C. Galton. 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.

    6/10 (page 174)
    ing to protect from pressure either the ulnar nerve and its accompanying vasa alone, or the median nerve and brachial vessels in addition to these. In man it has the character of a structure retained from an earlier and lower condition of existence, being, in other words, a “ Thierbildung,” while in other mammals it is a necessary and functional mechanical appendage of the elbow-joint. In order to find out the frequency of the occurrence of this muscle in man, Prof. Gruber in the space of less than a month examined one hundred bodies, that is, two hundred elbow- regions, and found its frequency thus distributed :—It was met with in 26 males and 8 females, and occurred on both sides in 15 male and 4 female subjects. It was found on one side only in 11 males and 4 females, being on the right side only in 9 males and 3 females, and on the left side alone in 2 males and 1 female. Without reckoning difference of sex it was present in every three subjects and in every four extremities. This muscle, when present, is generally well developed, rather than weak, in man, and is usually stronger in males, and on the right side, than in females, and on the left side29. Up to this time Prof. Gruber had thought that the presence of a third head to the biceps brachialis was the most frequent anomaly in the upper extremity, but he now came to the con- clusion that it was exceeded in frequency by the epitroclileo- anconeus. Though I will readily concede that the epitrochleo-anconeus may in man be occasionally adjutant to the triceps, it seems to be rather a straining after a reXo? to assume that any function other than an active one should be accredited to a muscle rather than it should be simply deemed rudimentary. For I cannot help regarding the function of an organ but as dependent upon its physical capacity, and could as soon conceive of a ligament taking upon itself the active duties of a muscle, as of the latter 29 Prof. J. Wood found this muscle (see Proc. Poy. Soc. June 18, 1858, p. 497) in four male subjects out of 36, in three instances in both arms, and in one on the left side only. A percentage of occurrences of this muscle founded upon Prof. Wood’s more limited—thanks to the encouragement to the study of anatomy afforded hy the legislature in this country—series of observations is, it will be readily seen, much smaller than one grounded upon the records of the Russian anatomist. This seeming fallacy can, it may possibly be objected, be due not to arithmetical considerations but to real differences of race.