Foreign bodies in the air-passages : the substance of two clinical lectures delivered in the Western Infirmary, Glasgow / by Hector C. Cameron.

  • Cameron, Hector Clare, 1843-1928.
Date:
[between 1890 and 1899]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Foreign bodies in the air-passages : the substance of two clinical lectures delivered in the Western Infirmary, Glasgow / by Hector C. Cameron. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    19/22 (page 115)
    llo same sort of spasm, of any body whioli lias gained accidental admission to the air-passages. Hence one great advantage of early opening the trachea, since afterwards a body may be coughed out of the mouth which before the operation would be more likely to cause a fatal asphyxia by spasm than to effect its escape. No case can better illus- trate this than that of the famous engineer Mr. Brunei, reported liy Sir Benjamin Brodie {“ The Works of Sir Benjamin C. Brodie, collected and arranged by Charles Hawkins, F.R.C.S.,” vol. iii. p. 124). J\Ir. B. on one occasion, when amusing some children after dinner, placed a half-sovereign in his mouth. By accident it slipped behind the tongue, and a violent fit of coughing, in which he had the appearance of being nearly choked, was the consequence. This occurred on the 3d of April, 1843. In the course of the evening he coughed at inter- vals, but the cough was not violent. For the next few days he suf- ferred little or no inconvenience. For a week or two he was able to attend to business and even occasionally travel into the country, but suffered more or less from cough. He found, after a time, that if he placed himself in a prone position, with his sternum resting on a chair and his head and neck inclined downward, he immediately felt a loose body slipping forward along the trachea. Violent convulsive cough ensued. On resuming the erect posture, he felt it move back towards the chest. Afterwards he placed himself, in order to make the experi- ment in a more complete manner, in the prone position on a platform made to be movable on a hinge in the centre. “ The shoulders and body having been fixed by means of a broad strap, the head was low- ered until the platform was brought to an angle of about 80° with the horizon. At first no cough ensued ; but ou the back, opposite the right bronchus, having been struck with the hand, Mr. B. began to cough violently. The half-sovereign, however, did not make its apjiearance. Tin's process was twice repeated, with uo better result; and on the last occasion the cough was so distressing and the ajipoarance of choking was so alarming that it became evident that it would be im- prudent to proceed further with the experiment unless some precaution were used to render it more safe.” Traclieotomy was performed a day or two afterwards, and some unsuccessful attempts made to find the half-sovereign with forceps. On a second occasion similar attempts were renewed, but only with the result of exciting violent convulsive action of the diaphragm and abdominal muscles on each inti’oduction of the forceps. Sixteen days after the tracheotomy had been per- formed it was resolved again to invert him ou the movable platform, now that a safety-valve was established and danger from a spasm of