The Surgery of the Skull and BrainRawling, Louis Bathe
Science
The Surgery of the Skull and Brain
Rawling, Louis Bathe
Brain -- Surgery; Skull -- Surgery
_A._ The soft cerebral substance is slowly but surely compressed, with
the result that the sulci on the surface of the brain are more or less
obliterated, distinction between the white and grey matter may be lost,
the ventricular spaces are enormously dilated, and, in the most marked
cases, a mere shell of brain may intervene between the ventricles and
the surface of the brain.
This cerebral compression results in the development of two main groups
of symptoms, those referable to the general increase in the
intraventricular pressure and those due to regional compression.
The more general results are headache, vomiting, optic neuritis and
atrophy, slow pulse-rate, somnolence, and coma. The temperature is
variable, more commonly rising during the more acute stages of the
disease, and falling to normal or subnormal during the quiescent
periods.
Localizing features are to be found in squints, inequality of pupils,
retraction of the head and neck, dyspnœa, and dysphagia, whilst
compression of the cortical motor centres is evidenced by twitchings,
convulsions, and spasticity of the limbs. General convulsions are by no
means uncommon. Remissions and intermissions of both local and general
symptoms are frequently observed, paralyses, for example, fluctuating in
depth and character.
_B._ The bones comprising the vault of the skull become greatly thinned
and widely separated from one another, the fontanelles enlarged, and the
sutures unduly prominent. The head becomes enlarged in all directions,
and its increased weight renders the child incapable of retaining
postural control, the head being top-heavy and falling about in all
directions.
The bones of the base share in the deformity. The pressure exerted on
the orbital plates of the frontal bone force the globe in the downward
direction in such a manner that the infra-corneal sclerotic is obscured
by the lower lid, whilst the supra-corneal portion is unduly prominent.
The bony eminences in the region of the sella turcica are diminished in
size, the middle fossa of the skull flattened from side to side, and the
posterior fossa from before backwards. In such cases the skull assumes
an almost dolicocephalic appearance. In any case, the disproportion
between the enlarged skull and diminutive face is a marked feature.[14]
The scalp becomes stretched, hairs are sparse and brittle, and the veins
dilated.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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