Controversy on the artificial tympanum : reprinted from The medical times and gazette, with additions / by James Yearsley.

  • Yearsley, James, 1805-1869.
Date:
1858
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Controversy on the artificial tympanum : reprinted from The medical times and gazette, with additions / by James Yearsley. 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.

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    cation of this simple remedy, that patients appear astonished on being so easily relieved.”—1 Anatomy and Physiology of the Organ of Hearing,’ pp. 105, 106; 1832. I will now quote Mr Yearsley’s words. They are: “ A small piece of wool, differing in size according to the case, and fully moistened in water, is introduced through the speculum to the bottom of the meatus, and adjusted superiorly, inferiorly, anteriorly, or posteriorly, according to the situation of the perforation and other circumstances (what are they?) con- nected with the case, but care must be taken that the entire opening be not covered, otherwise the experiment will not succeed.” Mr Yearsley also says : “ It is far from my wish to discourage the attempts of others to place aright these magical bits of wool, but truth compels me to add, that, simple as it may appear, it is an operation requiring the most delicate hand to manipulate with success, which great experience only can confer.” In the year 1852 Mr Yearsley announced the opinion that the way in which this cotton wool did good was “to support the remaining portion of the membrana tympani or the ossicula.” With a knowledge of these facts I started upon my own investigations, and although some of the statements were calculated to lead me directly away from the conclusions I subsequently arrived at in promulgating the theory of the functions of the membrana tympani and the insertion of an artificial one, still I have not the slightest hesitation in saying that Mr Yearsley's statements,—for I believe I had not then seen Mr Tod’s—were most valuable and suggestive to me; indeed, although my mind was constantly alive to the subject, it is of course possible that but for Mr Yearsley's paper, 1 might not have invented the artificial drum. And now that I have done what I truthfully believe to be full justice to Mr Yearsley, as the subject of the artificial membrana tympani is one of great interest to the Profession and the public, and is being brought under discussion in this country and on the continent, I will state fully my latest views on the subject. I have already shown from his own words, some of which I again quote, that Mr Yearsley’s discovery was this: that in cases of perforate membrana tympani great benefit is derived by passing down a portion of moistened cotton wool, and adjusting it “ superiorly, inferiorly, anteriorly, and posteriorly, according to the situation of the perforation and other circum- stances connected with the case: but care must be taken that the entire opening be not covered, otherwise the experiment will not succeed.” Mr Yearsley adds, that “to place aright