Another case of amputation of the thigh at its upper fourth in which acupressure was successfully employed : with remarks / by P.D. Handyside.

  • Handyside, P. D. (Peter David), 1808-1881.
Date:
[1862]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Another case of amputation of the thigh at its upper fourth in which acupressure was successfully employed : with remarks / by P.D. Handyside. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    OF ACUPRESSURE IN AMPUTATION. A. A. M., aged forty-one years, of strnmons habit, temperate, a native of Edinburgh, received, in 1839, while at Leeds, and leading a wandering life, a severe burn along the right thigh, knee, and leg, from a mass of live cinders that fell on him while he, being ex¬ hausted, lay asleep before the fire. He was taken to the Leeds Infirmary, where he remained for four months and a half ; at the end of which time there existed an extensive and obstinate ulcera¬ tion, for which he was transferred by the parochial authorities to Edinburgh, and remained under treatment in the Loyal Infirmary for five weeks. He then left the house with the burnt surface par¬ tially cicatrized. Thereupon the ulceration opened anew; and, in July 1840, he returned to the Infirmary, and came under my care; when, in addition to treatment for an ophthalmic affection, he had his limb attended to, which, he states, cicatrized before he left the house. A. A. M. afterwards went to Sheffield, where, for an erup¬ tive complaint, he took eighteen blue pills, by which he was pro¬ fusely salivated. So powerfully was his system affected by this medicine, that mercurial tremours, attended with paralysis of the bladder, supervened. Subsequently the ulceration broke out afresh. After this he wandered to London, and lay in St Bartholomew’s under treatment for a spreading ulceration of the old cicatrized sur¬ face. Thence he was returned to Scotland, as formerly; and, in April last, during fourteen days, lay again in the Infirmary here, but without improving in his condition; and before leaving that institution, although his life was in extreme peril from an excessive discharge of matter, he refused to submit to amputation of the limb. When asked in May 1861, by Hr M‘Cowan, to visit A. A. M., I found him emaciated, debilitated, and labouring under exhausting irritative fever, with extremely feeble intermitting pulse of about 160 per minute. But as he was apparently free from organic disease—an opinion in which I was confirmed by Professor Simpson —and as the sufferer was anxious for me to remove his limb, I placed him under preparatory treatment for the operation. During this time the greatest obstacle encountered in the way of progress, notwithstanding the large and lofty apartment occupied singly by the patient, was the putrid emanations that arose from the profuse discharge, mixed with blood, issuing from the ulcerated surfaces, as well as from abscesses in the popliteal cavity, which it had become necessary to open freely. A plentiful use, however, of Condy’s patent fluid proved of the greatest service in deodorizing the vitiated air of the room and lobby. Accordingly, A. A. M. rallied somewhat from a state of extreme prostration, and now presented the symptoms of pure hectic only.