On the use of massage and early passive movements in recent fractures and other common surgical injuries, and the treatment of internal derangements of the knee-joint : three clinical lectures delivered at St. George's Hospital / by William H. Bennett.

  • Bennett, William H. (William Henry), Sir, 1852-1931.
Date:
1900
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the use of massage and early passive movements in recent fractures and other common surgical injuries, and the treatment of internal derangements of the knee-joint : three clinical lectures delivered at St. George's Hospital / by William H. Bennett. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    32/116 (page 18)
    fracture of the leg because it is one of the most easy of fractures to manage., When fractures are treated on the lines I have described it will be found, if the practitioner will devote the necessary time, and when the sufferer has the patience, that a better result will follow than can be effected by any other plan, and that ultimately the time which is occupied in the complete recovery of the patient is little more than half of that which follows the treatment by splints in the ordinary manner. There is one injury in which the effect of the use of this plan from the beginning is most remarkable— viz. intracapsular fracture of the neck of the thigh¬ bone. So far as massage of the part is concerned in a fracture of that kind it cannot be commenced too early. If it is started a few minutes after the injury it is not too soon. In such cases, as you well know, the pain is sometimes very acute, and the spasm is often almost continuous, the patient complaining bitterly of the jumping of the limb and the intense discomfort caused by the spasm. The suffering resulting from the spasm can be removed very rapidly by smooth rubbing of the sort I have described. In such a frac¬ ture it is unnecessary to trouble about adjustment of the fragments. Bony union you know will not occur, and, failing that, the indication is to obtain as useful a limb as may be. The object in view should be to get a movable and painless limb with the muscles as