United States or Norway ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The left lung and cavity were perfectly normal. The right lung was engorged and somewhat compressed by the blood in the pleural cavity. The pericardium was much distended and contained from six to eight ounces of partially coagulated blood. There was a fibrinous clot in the left ventricle. Nonfatal Cardiac Injuries. Wounds of the heart are not necessarily fatal.
The examiner has only to describe the conditions which he finds, and is not required to indulge in conjectures as to the amount of respiration which may or may not have taken place. Gas due to putrefaction collects under the pleural membrane, and can be expelled by pressure, and is not found in the air cells.
The lungs are spongy and porous, and their tissues are very elastic. They are covered with a delicately constructed but strong sac, known as the pleural sac, one wall of which closely adheres to the lung, and the other to the inner wall of the chest, and which secretes a fluid which allows the inner surfaces of the walls to glide easily upon each other in the act of breathing.
In one of Kirchner's cases a girl of nine had been violently pushed against a window-sill, striking the front of her chest in front of the 3d rib. She suffered from pleural effusion, which, on aspiration, proved to be chyle. She ultimately recovered her health. In 1891 Eyer reported a case of rupture of the thoracic duct, causing death on the thirty-eighth day.
On placing the ear against the wall of the chest and listening to the respirations, we are able to hear friction sounds. After a few days effusion occurs in the pleural cavity. Although the animal may have refused to eat up to this time, it now appears greatly relieved and may offer to eat its feed. This relief may be only temporary.
We may determine the extent of the pleural exudate by auscultation. There is no evidence of respiratory sounds in that portion of the chest below the surface of the fluid. Dropsical swellings may occur on the under surface of the breast and abdomen. In subacute cases evidence of recovery is noted in from four to ten days. Acute pleurisy very often terminates fatally.
The pleural sacs that enclose the lungs are dorsal parts of the head-coelom, originating from the pleuroducts; the pericardium in which the heart afterwards lies is also double originally, being formed from ventral halves of the head-coelom, which only combine at a later stage.
This occurs from gangrene, and putrefactive changes, or in some instances, from the ulcerative process, so constantly observed in the segregation of dead from living tissues. Abscesses are not infrequently found in different parts of the lungs. Sometimes circumscribed, at others connected with bronchial tubes, and not infrequently communicating with the pleural cavity.
No part of the body is so well supplied with blood as the lungs. A, A’. Places occupied by the lungs. B, B’. Slight space within the pleural sacs containing the pleural secretion, a, a’. Outer layer of pleura and lining of chest walls and upper surface of diaphragm. b, b’. Inner layer of pleura and outer lining of lungs. C. Space occupied by the heart. D. Diaphragm.
Of the multiple arrow-wounds, six out of the seven cases were fatal. In five in which the cranial cavity was wounded, four patients perished. There were two remarkable instances of recovery after penetration of the pleural cavity by arrows.
Word Of The Day