When the operation is required in consequence of the bursting, or
abortion, of an early gravid tube, great promptness is often required on
the part of the surgeon to prevent the patient dying from hæmorrhage,
and although the operation in these circumstances is really an
oöphorectomy, it often has to be performed in the patient’s room as an
emergency operation and without the elaborate surroundings of a modern
operating theatre.
There are few accidents which test the skill, nerve, and resource of a
surgeon more than cœliotomy for a suspected intraperitoneal hæmorrhage
from a gravid tube, and few operations are attended with such brilliant
results. Surgeons are often astonished to find a large amount of blood
in the pelvis due to a small perforation in a gestation-sac no bigger
than a cherry (Fig. 7).
=Operation.= In removing tubes of this kind it is necessary to apply the
ligature on the uterine side of the rent in cases of rupture of the
tube, but when the rent involves the wall of the uterus the opening will
require the application of a mattress suture for its complete closure.
In some rare instances of the interstitial variety of tubal pregnancy,
the uterus has been so involved that in order to effectually control the
bleeding it has been found necessary to remove the uterus.
After the pedicle has been safely ligatured and the blood removed, the
abdominal incision is sutured as described on p. 9. When the shock due
to the bleeding and operation has been great, it is sometimes judicious
to pour one or two pints of saline solution at the temperature of 102°
F. direct into the abdominal cavity.
[Illustration: FIG. 7. A GRAVID FALLOPIAN TUBE. There is a hole in the
gestation-sac, and tufts of villi project through it. The patient was in
the seventh week of her tenth pregnancy when she was seized with
abdominal pain and died in ten hours from hæmorrhage. (_Museum of St.
Bartholomew’s Hospital._) Natural size.]
The majority of cases of internal bleeding from gravid tubes in the
early stages are submitted to operation at periods varying from a few
hours, days, weeks, or even months, after the primary bleeding.
When the tube bursts, the hæmorrhage may not be so profuse as to induce
death; and the woman, recovering from the shock, does not manifest such
grave symptoms as to demand surgical aid. The consequence is that the
patient sometimes remains for several weeks under palliative treatment
(unless a renewal of bleeding kills her), and at last she seeks surgical
advice. Appreciation of the true nature of the case leads to operation.
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