Treatment. This does not differ materially from that demanded by penetrating wounds with fracture. A perfect cleansing and antisepsis of the wound is the first demand. A solution of boric acid (4 per cent.) or of mercuric chloride (1 ∶ 5000) liberally applied, and maintained thereafter on soft pledgets of surgical cotton, will often have the best results. All foreign bodies must be carefully removed, lacerated flaps and shreds may require suturing, dead portions excision, and finally abscesses or excessive exudate may require the lance, but cooling, antiseptic lotions and an elevated position of the head, are among the most prominent resorts.
RETRO-BULBAR ABSCESS.
Schindelka has observed this in the horse, in connection with petechial fever. If connected with meningeal abscess it will be necessarily fatal. In favorable cases evacuate the pus as soon as detected and dress with pledgets of cotton saturated with a mercuric chloride solution (1:2000) or other antiseptic.
PERIOSTITIS OF THE ORBIT.
This may be shown by the firm swelling of the bone and, in case a wound has been formed, by the contact of the probe with the denuded, hard, rough bone. When thus exposed or necrosed on the surface, or when an exostosis has formed, the bone may be laid open and scraped down to the healthy tissue, and then dressed with antiseptic pledgets.
TUMORS OF THE ORBIT.
These may be of different kinds, as sarcoma, encephaloid, osteoma and actinomycosis. They demand thorough surgical treatment, except perhaps in the case of the latter, which may recover under iodide of potassium. Emmerich records an extensive sarcoma of the orbit in a cow, weighing six pounds and extending into the nasal sinuses, and chambers, and implicating the cerebral meninges. Möller records cases of sarcoma and carcinoma of the orbit in horses and dogs, and Leblanc in cattle. Melanosarcoma is not uncommon in the orbits of gray horses which are changing to white.
Exotoses are common around the orbits of cattle.
If such growths do not show on the surface they cause a more or less unsightly protrusion of the eyeball, owing to the presence of the neoplasm in the depth of the orbit, and the removal of the bulb becomes a necessity.