Warren records the case of a woman of
sixty who, while carrying a clothes-basket, made a misstep and
fell 14 feet, the basket of wet clothes striking the right
shoulder, chest, and neck. There was fracture of the 4th dorsal
vertebra at the transverse processes. By seizing the spinous
process it could be bent backward and forward, with the peculiar
crepitus of fractured bone. The clavicle was fractured two inches
from the acromial end, and the sternal end was driven high up
into the muscles of the neck. The arm and hand were paralyzed,
and the woman suffered great dyspnea. There was at first a grave
emphysematous condition due to the laceration of several broken
ribs. There was also suffusion and ecchymosis about the neck and
shoulder. Although complicated with tertiary syphilis, the woman
made a fair recovery, and eight weeks later she walked into a
doctor's office. Many similar and equally wonderful injuries to
the spine are on record.
The results sometimes following the operation of laminectomy for
fracture of the vertebrae are often marvelous. One of the most
successful on record is that reported by Dundore. The patient was
a single man who lived in Mahanoy, Pa., and was admitted to the
State Hospital for Injured Persons, Ashland, Pa.
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