On diseases of the throat, epiglottis, and windpipe : including diphtheria, nervous sore-throat, displacements of the cartilages, weakness of the voice and chest their symptoms, progress, and treatment / by George D. Gibb.

  • Gibb, G. Duncan (George Duncan), Sir, 1821-1876.
Date:
1860
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On diseases of the throat, epiglottis, and windpipe : including diphtheria, nervous sore-throat, displacements of the cartilages, weakness of the voice and chest their symptoms, progress, and treatment / by George D. Gibb. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    •with the presence of hectic fever^ night sweats, and emaciation; and when all constitutional means do no more than palliate, a fistulous opening should be made into the trachea to relieve the more or less constant dyspnoea, and to hold out a chance for the laryngeal mischief to improve, and in favourable cases to heal up and get well. This is rational and good practice, because local applications are valueless in the advanced stage of cartilaginous disease, and all internal remedies prove of no avail whatever. Yet, to obtain the benefit of the operation, it should not be left to the last moment, more especially when the larger cartilages are affected, for they have been known to act as a foreign body, and thus prove a constant source of irritation, which has ended badly in a short time. When this is the. case, and the seat of the necrosis can be clearly made out, after immediate danger is overcome by cutting a hole in the trachea, the thyroid cartilage must be laid open through one of its wings, so that the pent- up dead portion can be removed. This might prove to be the entire cricoid laying bare and loose. If the disease is then checked by the internal applica- tion of various topical measures through the wound made to remove the necrosed cartilages, it can be closed by a plastic operation at a future period, the fistula lower down being permitted to remain open for the purposes of breathing. The larger cartilages, when partially necrosed, and the pieces detached cannot be expelled through the small opening in the