There was but
little hemoptysis and the patient soon recovered. Chelius records
an instance of penetration of the chest by a carriage shaft, with
subsequent recovery. Hoyland mentions a man of twenty-five who
was discharging bar-iron from the hold of a ship; in a stooping
position, preparatory to hoisting a bundle on deck, he was struck
by one of the bars which pinned him to the floor of the hold,
penetrating the thorax, and going into the wood of the flooring
to the extent of three inches, requiring the combined efforts of
three men to extract it. The bar had entered posteriorly between
the 9th and 10th ribs of the left side, and had traversed the
thorax in an upward and outward direction, coming out anteriorly
between the 5th and 6th ribs, about an inch below and slightly
external to the nipple. There was little constitutional
disturbance, and the man was soon discharged cured. Brown records
a case of impalement in a boy of fourteen. While running to a
fire, he struck the point of the shaft of a carriage, which
passed through his left chest, below the nipple. There was,
strangely, no hemorrhage, and no symptoms of so severe an injury;
the boy recovered.
There is deposited in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons
in London, a mast-pivot, 15 inches in length and weighing between
seven and eight pounds, which had passed obliquely through the
body of a sailor.
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