Part 63
In cases of complete dislocation at the ankle-joint, complicated with an external wound, whether the displacement be inward or outward, you are not to reduce the parts, but let any other physician reduce them if he choose. For this you should know for certain, that the patient will die if the parts are allowed to remain reduced, and that he will not survive more than a few days, for few of them pass the seventh day, being cut off by convulsions, and sometimes the leg and foot are seized with gangrene. It should be well known that such will be the results; and it does not appear to me that hellebore will do any good, though administered the same day, and the draught repeated, and yet it is the most likely means, if any such there be; but I am of opinion that not even it will be of service. But if not reduced, nor any attempts at first made to reduce them, most of such cases recover. The leg and foot are to be arranged as the patient wishes, only they must not be put in a dependent position, nor moved about; and they are to be treated with pitched cerate, a few compresses dipped in wine, and not very cold, for cold in such cases induces convulsions; the leaves also of beet, or of colt's foot, of any such, when boiled in dark-colored austere wine, form a suitable application to the wound and the surrounding parts; and the wound may further be anointed with cerate in a tepid state. But if it be the winter season, the part is to be covered with unscoured wool, which is to be sprinkled from above with tepid wine and oil, but on no account is either bandage or compress to be applied; for this should be known most especially, that whatever compresses, or is heavy, does mischief in such cases. And certain of
[p. 263]the dressings used to recent wounds are suitable in such cases; and wool may be laid upon the sore, and sprinkled with wine, and allowed to remain for a considerable time; but those dressings for recent wounds which only last for a few days, and into which resin enters as an ingredient, do not agree with them; for the cleansing of the sores is a slow process, and the sore has a copious discharge for a long time. Certain of these cases it may be advantageous to bandage. It ought also to be well understood, that the patient must necessarily be much maimed and deformed, for the foot is retracted outward, and the bones which have been displaced outward protrude: these bones, in fact, not being generally laid bare, unless to a small extent; neither do they exfoliate, but they heal by thin and feeble cicatrices, provided the patient keeps quiet for a length of time; but otherwise there is danger that a small ulcer may remain incurable. And yet in the case we are treating of, those who are thus treated are saved; whereas, when the parts are reduced and allowed to remain in place, the patients die.
