Observations on the diseases of the rectum / by T.B. Curling.

  • Curling, Thomas Blizard, 1811-1888.
Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the diseases of the rectum / by T.B. Curling. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    blocked up by cancerous disease as entirely to close the passage for the faeces. Under these circumstances, the surgeon, having exhausted the usual means of giving relief, will have to consider the propriety of forming an artificial anus. I should think no surgeon would be much disposed to perform the operation in such a case; but it would still be his duty, if the con- stitutional powers were not materially affected by the disease, to represent to the patient the chance yet left of obtaining a prolongation of life, and the painful conditions of the tenure, and then to undertake the operation in compliance with his wishes, and those of the friends. The rectum appears to be liable to a form of cance- rous ulcer and stricture which is not commonly recog- nised as a disease of the part—viz., epithelial cancer. Rokitansky noticed the disease, but does not seem to have fully satisfied himself as to its true nature. He states—'' There are certain ulcers which occur only in the large intestine, and especially in the sigmoid flexure and the rectum, and are nearly allied to cancer, and particularly to cutaneous cancer. They are gene- rally solitary, but there may be two, three, or four, at a time. They invariably give rise to intense pain. He describes them as zonular, and having a callous base, upon which occasionally a discoloured, brownish, grumous discharge is visible, and as surrounded by a thick, tumid, spongy, carneous, and irregularly sinuous margin of mucous membrane. They generally cause a diminution of the capacity of the intestine, though not