FRACTURES AND DISLOCATIONS
While there is very little a member of the family or a non-medical friend can do in case of a fracture, and while it is unwise to offer suggestions relative to the setting of bones, yet it is highly important that both the family and friends know how properly to support a broken leg while carrying a disabled person into the house or to near-by medical aid.
For instance, in the case of a fractured leg below the knee, if a couple of flat boards three inches wide be tied about the leg with two pocket handkerchiefs, the ends of the fractured bone will not rub against each other and the pain will be much less in carrying. In this way all danger of causing the broken bones to protrude and thus "compounding" the fracture is also avoided. And also, if there is no near-by ambulance, a good emergency stretcher may be improvised out of two or three buttoned vests with two poles, rakes, or brooms run through the armholes—one vest under the shoulders and one under the hips and still another under the fracture. An injured person may in this way be carried for miles quite comfortably.
Two people may fashion a seat out of their four hands on which the disabled child may sit with his arms about the necks of his two friends. If the fractured end of the bone penetrates the flesh it is then known as a compound fracture and the utmost cleanliness must prevail—as in dressing other wounds. An X ray laboratory should always be sought, where convenient, to ascertain if the ends of the bones are in good position.
In dislocations, the bone has slipped out of place at the joint. Medical aid should be called to replace the bone, while hot applications may be used in the meantime.