Fractures and dislocations / by T. Pickering Pick.

  • Thomas Pickering Pick
Date:
1885
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Fractures and dislocations / by T. Pickering Pick. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    uutovn part of tlie capsular ligament, and that in oi-der to succeed without this it is necessary that these ligaments should be relaxed by flexion of the thigh on the pelvis before any traction is made. This plan was adopted by Mr. Quain many years ago in a case of dislocation of the hip, in which, by making his traction with the thigh flexed at right angles to the trunk, he was enabled speedily to eflect reduction. The head of the thigh bone when dislocated may be restored to its proper position by manipulation or by extension. By manipulation.—By this means almost aU recent dislocations of the hip can be reduced, and this without any great expenditure of force, and the plan should always be first adopted before recourse is had to any severer measures. The object of this plan of treatment is to endeavour by certain movements of the limb to make the head of the bone retrace the same steps which it has taken, and thus induce it to I'eturn through the same opening in the capsule through which it has forced its way. There can be no doubt that this plan is far more scientific and much to be preferred to the old plan of redaction by means of extension with the pulleys or otherwise, where an endeavour was made to overcome the dis- placement by sheer force, an endeavour which must be accompanied by a certain amount of damage to the tissues around the joint. Bigelow considers that the flexion method is the only rational one, and that pulleys are practically obsolete. Whether the latter part of this assertion may be regarded as true or not, it is unquestionably the proper treatment to attempt, at all events in the first instance, the reduction of any dislocation of the hip by means of Tnanipulation, and in most recent cases this plan of ti-eatment, if properly con- ducted, will be found to succeed, and also in many