Surgical observations, with cases and operations / by J. Mason Warren.

  • Warren, Jonathan Mason, 1811-1867.
Date:
1867
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Surgical observations, with cases and operations / by J. Mason Warren. 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.

    38/668 (page 18)
    CHAPTEE II. THE FACE. EHINOPLASTIC OPERATIONS. The operation of rhinoplasty is of very ancient date. It had, however, for various reasons, fallen into most unmerited disrepute until between thirty and forty years since, when it was revived in Europe by Graefe, Dieffenbach, and Labat on the continent, and Liston in Great Britain. In the ancient operations of this kind, the lost organ was restored at the expense of the integuments in its immediate neighborhood. Advantage being taken of the extensibility of the skin of the cheeks, the integuments were dissected up on both sides of the nasal fossa, brought forward, and united in the centre by points of the interrupted suture. If the extensi- bility of the integuments was not sufficiently great, incisions were made in front of the ears, so as to diminish the tension of the skin: the wounds thus made were afterwards allowed to fill up by granulation. This operation, however, did not restore the form of the lost organ; and the only advantage gained was a flap of skin to cover the existing deformity. The operation, which was afterwards adopted, and which now bears the name of the author, was that of Taliacotius. In this operation, it was required that the arm should be confined in contact with the face for ten or fifteen days, or until union had taken place. The disadvantages of this method are at once manifest: the length of time during which it was necessary to keep the limb in this painful condition, sufficient in some cases to produce partial paralysis, and the danger, that ensued in the too early separation of the transplanted skin from its source of nutrition, were, of themselves, reasons of sufficient weight to cause it to fall into disuse.