Fig. 295.—Dressing for claw after operation.
The customary operations on the apparatus of locomotion are almost entirely confined to the feet. They consist in operations for sand crack, picked-up nail, stabs by nails and bruising of the sole, elsewhere mentioned. As they call for no special precautions they need not be further mentioned here.
SURGICAL DRESSING FOR A CLAW.
The surgical dressing necessitated by the operation for sand crack, picked-up nail, or injury to the heels is often very difficult to fix in the ox, and necessitates a support round the pastern. It can, however, be secured in the following way:
The seat of operation is covered with small antiseptic pads, which are also applied round the pastern and in the interdigital space. A bandage is then passed twice round the pastern and over the posterior two-thirds of the claw, as in fixing the dressing used after removal of the lateral cartilage in the horse. The bandage is then passed repeatedly round the pastern in an upward direction and tied above the interdigital space.
AMPUTATION OF THE CLAW OR OF THE TWO LAST PHALANGES.
It sometimes happens that certain grave diseases in the foot or pastern (stabs or picked-up nails, panaritium of the interdigital space, necrosis of the ends of the flexor tendons, etc.) are accompanied by necrosis of the bones, suppurative synovitis, and even suppurative arthritis of the second and first inter-phalangeal joints.
If carefully treated these forms of arthritis may disappear, leaving the joints anchylosed, but unfortunately the application of the necessary antiseptic injections (free injection with warm boiled water, injection of 10 per cent. iodised glycerine, 3 per cent. carbolic glycerine or ·1 per cent. sublimate) is difficult and costly.
Fig. 296.—Anatomical relations of the inter-phalangeal joints.