Case of Idiopathic Erysipelas
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1865
American Journal of the Medical Sciences
ward the patient was placed, his limb was found red and swollen, the tumefaction reaching to the middle of the thigh ; the colour was livid, and the temperature of the inflamed parts lower than normal. The constitutional condition of the patient was at the same time typhoid in the extreme. After the erysipe¬ latous blush had begun to subside, which occurred about the 10th of April, it was found that the knee-joint was very much swollen and evidently dis¬ tended with fluid. This distension
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... sed for about a week, and then gradually diminished. A few weeks later (in the early part of May) the left knee-joint began to swell, and finally attained the size of a man's head, when it pointed, opened spontaneously, and discharged about one pint of pus. About this time a bed-sore formed over the sacrum, and rapidly en¬ larged ; another formed shortly after over the right hip. The discharge from the left knee-joint ceased a few days before death, but began again the day of the fatal issue, which ensued on June 3d, 1864. The treatment throughout had been nutritious, tonic, and stimulating, with the local application of mucilaginous washes. An autopsy was made twenty-four hours after death with the following results: Absolutely no rigor-mortis whatever; the cadaver was much emaciated, with great swelling of both lower extremities. The head was not examined. There was some hypostatic congestion of the lungs, and the cardiac cavities contained fibrinous clots: no other abnormal appear¬ ances in the thoracic viscera. The liver was very fatty, and slightly larger than normal; the other abdominal organs seemed healthy. An incision was made into the right knee-joint, and gave exit to not less than a pint of pus; the articulating surfaces of femur and tibia were found much eroded, nearly all cartilaginous structure having disappeared. A similar condition of things prevailed on the left side. The purulent deposit on the left side being considered secondary or " metastatic," the great venous trunks on the right, and the ascending cava were carefully examined, without any traces of phlebitis or of purulent absorption being detected.
doi:10.1097/00000441-186507000-00023
fatcat:3d2kb4gqdjf4hpzgl6kxm4wb5e