COMPLICATIONS AND TREATMENT OF THE OPERATION — COLICS — TEARING OF THE CLAMPS — HEMORRHAGE — SWELLING OF THE SCROTAL REGION — GANGRENE — ABSCESSES — CHAMPIGNON — EXTRA SCROTAL — INTRA SCROTAL — INTRA ABDOMINAL — VARIOUS TREATMENTS — FISTULA OF THE SCROTUM — INGUINAL HERNIA — PERITONITIS — TETANUS — AMAUROSIS — COMPARATIVE VIEW OF THE VARIOUS MODES OF CASTRATION.
COMPLICATIONS AND THEIR TREATMENT.
Though the operation of castration is comparatively simple in its various methods and is generally successful in its results, still it is not entirely free from accidents or complications. Indeed, among those likely to meet our notice, there are some of quite a serious character, which will develop themselves independently of the skill and care with which the operation may have been performed or whatsoever attention may have been bestowed upon the patient. Among these may be enumerated colics, hemorrhage, swelling of the scrotum, gangrene, abscesses, champignon, fistula, hernia, peritonitis, tetanus, and amaurosis.
COLICS.
This, we have already seen, usually appears a short time after the completion of the operation, the suffering animal becoming uneasy, restless in his stall, pawing the ground with his fore feet, and sometimes lying down and rolling. As I have before stated, these symptoms, as a rule, are of short duration, and subside without other treatment than a little walking exercise. It is rarely the case that they fail to yield to an anodyne, or a dose of chloral may be demanded before the symptoms are subdued.
TEARING OF THE CLAMPS.
When this accident occurs it is commonly attributable to the omission of a careless operator to secure the tail of the animal in such a manner as to prevent its interference with those implements by its entanglement, and tearing them from the end of the cord, as a consequence. The result of this is the appearance of a hemorrhage from the spermatic artery, which can only be controlled by either a reapplication of the clamps to the end of the cord—if it can be thus secured—or by other means, which will be considered when we reach the subject of bleeding in general as connected with other causes.
HEMORRHAGE
May be primary or secondary. In the first instance it occurs in consequence of the insufficiency of the means of hemostasis applied to the end of the cord, as in the case of the operation by simple excision, by cauterization, the too rapid crushing of the cord, torsion, or the accident before referred to—when the clamps have been torn off and the cord lacerated about the point of their application.
Secondary hemorrhage manifests itself after a longer interval following the operation. It may occur, for example, after the removal of the clamps, or when, during their removal, the mortified end of the cord is too much interfered with by the sharp end of the instrument used in cutting the string which confines them together, or from too forcibly pulling upon the cord itself; and in some instances without any assignable cause other than a diseased condition of the coats of the artery. This secondary hemorrhage is usually, by reason of the inflammatory condition of the blood vessels, of more threatening aspect and more difficult to control than the primary variety. The treatment indicated varies. When caused by the tearing of the clamps, or at the time of their removal, it may be checked by the reapplication of the instrument. But if the cord is retracted within the inguinal canal and cannot be reached, and if it is already adherent to the surrounding tissues, by granulations recently formed, the checking of the flow may be very difficult. In many cases the application of cold water, either in the shape of the cold douche over the part, or iced sponges, may prove sufficient. But in other cases the cavity of the wound must be packed with balls of oakum, wet either with water alone or any styptic agent, such as a solution of perchloride of iron, the whole being kept in place by a suspensory bandage, or if necessary, a few points of suture.