Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine [406]
hemorrhage. He found the man very feeble, without pulse, pale, and livid. By digital examination he found a hard body in the rectum, which he was sure was not feces. This body he removed with a polyp-forceps, and found it to be a cylindric candle-box, which measured six inches in circumference, 2 1/2 in length, and 1 1/2 in diameter. The removal was followed by a veritable flood of fecal material, and the man recovered. Lane reports perforation of the rectum by the introduction of two large pieces of soap; there was coincident strangulated hernia.
Hunter mentions a native Indian, a resident of Coorla, who had introduced a bullock's horn high up into his abdomen, which neither he nor his friends could extract. He was chloroformed and placed in the lithotomy position, his buttocks brought to the edge of the bed, and after dilatation of the sphincter, by traction with the fingers and tooth-forceps, the horn was extracted. It measured 11 inches long. The young imbecile had picked it up on the road, where it had been rendered extremely rough by exposure, and this caused the difficulty in extraction.
In Nelson's Northern Lancet, 1852, there is the record of a case of a man at stool, who slipped on a cow's horn, which entered the rectum and lodged beyond the sphincter. It was only removed with great difficulty.
A convict at Brest put up his rectum a box of tools. Symptoms of vomiting, meteorism, etc., began, and became more violent until the seventh day, when he died. After death, there was found in the transverse colon, a cylindric or conic box, made of sheet iron, covered with skin to protect the rectum and, doubtless, to aid expulsion. It was six inches long and five inches broad and weighed 22 ounces. It contained a piece of gunbarrel four inches long, a mother-screw steel, a screw-driver, a saw of steel for cutting wood four inches long, another saw for cutting metal, a boring syringe, a prismatic file, a half-franc piece and four one-franc pieces tied together with thread, a piece of thread, and a piece of tallow, the latter presumably for greasing the instruments. On investigation it was found that these conic cases were of common use, and were always thrust up the rectum base first. In excitement this prisoner had pushed the conic end up first, thus rendering expulsion almost impossible. Ogle gives an interesting case of foreign body in the rectum of a boy of seventeen. The boy was supposed to be suffering with an abdominal tumor about the size of a pigeon's egg under the right cartilages; it had been noticed four months before. On admission to the hospital the lad was suffering with pain and jaundice; sixteen days later he passed a stick ten inches long, which he reluctantly confessed that he had introduced into the anus. During all his treatment he was conscious of the nature of his trouble, but he suffered rather than confess. Studsgaard mentions a man of thirty-five who, for the purpose of stopping diarrhea, introduced into his rectum a preserve-bottle nearly seven inches long with the open end uppermost. The next morning he had violent pain in the abdomen, and the bottle could be felt through the abdominal wall. It was necessary to perform abdominal section through the linea alba, divide the sigmoid flexure, and thus remove the bottle. The intestine was sutured and the patient recovered. The bottle measured 17 cm. long, five cm. in diameter at its lower end, and three cm. at its upper end.
Briggs reports a case in which a wine glass was introduced into the rectum, and although removed twenty-four hours afterward, death ensued. Hockenhull extracted 402 stones from the rectum of a boy of seven. Landerer speaks of a curious case in which the absorptive power of the rectum was utilized in the murder of a boy of fifteen. In order to come into the possession of a large inheritance the murderess poisoned the boy by introducing the ends of some phosphorous matches into his rectum, causing death that night; there was intense inflammation of the rectum. The woman was speedily apprehended, and committed suicide when
Hunter mentions a native Indian, a resident of Coorla, who had introduced a bullock's horn high up into his abdomen, which neither he nor his friends could extract. He was chloroformed and placed in the lithotomy position, his buttocks brought to the edge of the bed, and after dilatation of the sphincter, by traction with the fingers and tooth-forceps, the horn was extracted. It measured 11 inches long. The young imbecile had picked it up on the road, where it had been rendered extremely rough by exposure, and this caused the difficulty in extraction.
In Nelson's Northern Lancet, 1852, there is the record of a case of a man at stool, who slipped on a cow's horn, which entered the rectum and lodged beyond the sphincter. It was only removed with great difficulty.
A convict at Brest put up his rectum a box of tools. Symptoms of vomiting, meteorism, etc., began, and became more violent until the seventh day, when he died. After death, there was found in the transverse colon, a cylindric or conic box, made of sheet iron, covered with skin to protect the rectum and, doubtless, to aid expulsion. It was six inches long and five inches broad and weighed 22 ounces. It contained a piece of gunbarrel four inches long, a mother-screw steel, a screw-driver, a saw of steel for cutting wood four inches long, another saw for cutting metal, a boring syringe, a prismatic file, a half-franc piece and four one-franc pieces tied together with thread, a piece of thread, and a piece of tallow, the latter presumably for greasing the instruments. On investigation it was found that these conic cases were of common use, and were always thrust up the rectum base first. In excitement this prisoner had pushed the conic end up first, thus rendering expulsion almost impossible. Ogle gives an interesting case of foreign body in the rectum of a boy of seventeen. The boy was supposed to be suffering with an abdominal tumor about the size of a pigeon's egg under the right cartilages; it had been noticed four months before. On admission to the hospital the lad was suffering with pain and jaundice; sixteen days later he passed a stick ten inches long, which he reluctantly confessed that he had introduced into the anus. During all his treatment he was conscious of the nature of his trouble, but he suffered rather than confess. Studsgaard mentions a man of thirty-five who, for the purpose of stopping diarrhea, introduced into his rectum a preserve-bottle nearly seven inches long with the open end uppermost. The next morning he had violent pain in the abdomen, and the bottle could be felt through the abdominal wall. It was necessary to perform abdominal section through the linea alba, divide the sigmoid flexure, and thus remove the bottle. The intestine was sutured and the patient recovered. The bottle measured 17 cm. long, five cm. in diameter at its lower end, and three cm. at its upper end.
Briggs reports a case in which a wine glass was introduced into the rectum, and although removed twenty-four hours afterward, death ensued. Hockenhull extracted 402 stones from the rectum of a boy of seven. Landerer speaks of a curious case in which the absorptive power of the rectum was utilized in the murder of a boy of fifteen. In order to come into the possession of a large inheritance the murderess poisoned the boy by introducing the ends of some phosphorous matches into his rectum, causing death that night; there was intense inflammation of the rectum. The woman was speedily apprehended, and committed suicide when