An elementary treatise on midwifery, or, Principles of tokology and embryology / by Alf. A.L.M. Velpeau ; translated from the French by Charles D. Meigs.

  • Velpeau, A. (Alfred), 1795-1867.
Date:
1845
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An elementary treatise on midwifery, or, Principles of tokology and embryology / by Alf. A.L.M. Velpeau ; translated from the French by Charles D. Meigs. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    notch; the postero-inferior spine of the ilium; which articulates with the sacrum; the great ischiatic notch; the ischiatic spine; the small ischiatic notch, and the most posterior portion of the tuberosity of the ischium. 22. At birth, the coxal bone is composed of three distinct pieces : one superior, the ilium, which constitutes the hip and the two iliac fossa; one inferior, the ischium, which supports the weight of the body when seated; the third, anterior, the pubis, to which are appended, as it were, the organs of generation. It is in the cotyloid cavity, at the ileo-pectineal eminence, and in the middle of the ischio-pubal ramus, that these three bones at length are blended into one about the period of puberty; but there are com- monly added in childhood, a plate for the crest of the ilium, one for the tuberosity of the ischium, another point of ossification for the antero-inferior spine, and a fourth for the spine of the pubis; which sometimes do not coalesce with the principal pieces until a very late period. SECTION 2. Of the Articulations, or Symphyses of the Pelvis. 23. There are three principal articulations of the pelvis: one for the two pubes in front, and two for the bones of the ilium and the sacrum behind. 24. At the anterior or median symphysis, the bones are kept in contact by a fibro-cartilaginous substance called the interpubal ligament, and whose thickness is far from being uniform at every point of the kind of ring or oval circle which it represents. Its thickness, which is very considerable on the upper part, a little less so in front, and much less so behind, becomes suddenly much greater below, where the fibrous body assumes the name of sub- pubal or triangular ligament.* In the centre, the articular sur- faces are separated by a very thin plate of cartilage, which in early life, and even in a good many adult women, is moistened by a small quantity of synovial fluid. A portion of the periosteum lines the posterior surface, a fibrous lamina of the same material is observed in front, and these two layers have received the names of anterior and posterior ligaments of the symphysis pubis. 25. The sacro-iliac or posterior symphyses are much more com- plex than the preceding. There the sacrum is locked, like a double * At the symphysis pubis there are two smooth cartilaginous sur- faces, a synovial membrane and a small quantity of synovial fluid, con- stituting a complete joint.—H. 3*