SECONDARY HAeMORRHAGE AFTER AMPUTATION

Abstract

The patient very soon rallied after the operation the stump was enveloped in cotton wool, and was kept somewhat raised for about a fortnight. The ligature came away on the sixteenth day: there was no recurrence of bleeding, and the patient progressed favourably afterwards.The reasons that induced me in this instance to tie the common femoral artery, instead of stripping open the stump, and searching for the bleeding vessel, were, the prostrate condition of the patient, the facility of the operation, the small quantity of blood that would be lost during its performance, and the probability that the bleeding came from some large branch of the profunda. During the operation not half an ounce of blood was lost. Had the stump been laid freely open, the severity of the operation, and the large amount of blood that would have escaped from a number of small vessels, and probably from the artery that had given way, might, in the enfeebled state of the patient, have brought on a fatal termination.