The workes of that famous chirurgion Ambrose Parey translated out of Latine and compared with the French. by Th: Johnson

CHAP. III. Of the causes of Dislocations.

THere are three generall causes of Luxations, internall, externall, and he∣reditarie. The internall are excrementitious humors and flatulencies, * 1.1 which, settling into the joynts with great force and plentie, doe so make slipperie, soften & relaxe the ligaments which binde together the bones, that they easily fall out of their cavities; or else they so fill and distend these liga∣ments, and make them so short, that being contracted, they also contract the appendi∣ces of the bones from whence they arise, and so pluck them from the bone where∣on they are placed, or else draw the heads of the bones out of their cavities, chief∣ly if the violence of a noxious humor doth also concurre, which possessing and fil∣ling up the cavities of the joynts, puts them from their seats, as it oft times happens to the joynt of the hip by Sciaticaes, and to the Vertebrae of the spine, by whose Luxation people become gibbous, or otherwise crooked. But externall causes of * 1.2 Dislocations are, fals from high, bruising and heavie blowes, the Rack, Strappado, slipping in going, and all such like things, which may force the heads of the bones to fly out of their seats, or cavities, which also happens somtimes to infants in their birth, when as they are too carelesly and violently drawne forth by the Midwife, so that eyther their armes or legges are put out of joynt. Hereditarie causes are such * 1.3 as the Parents transfuse into their off-spring: hence it is, that crooked not necessa∣rily, but often times are generated by crooked, and lame by lame. The truth whereof is evident by daily experience. Besides also Hippocrates himselfe averres, * 1.4 that infants in the very wombe may have their Joynts dislocated by a fall, blow and compression, & by the too much humidity and loosenes of the Joynts: whence also we see many crooke legg'd and footed from their nativitie; so that none need marvell or make any doubt hereof. We have read it observed by Galen In librum de Artic. that children may have impostumes in their mothers wombs, which may * 1.5 cast forth quitture, the ulcers being opened of their own accord, and be cicatrized by the only benefit of nature. It also happens to many from their first conformati∣on, that the cavities of their Joynts are lesse deprest than they should bee, and that

their verges are more dilated than they ought to be; whereby it happens that the heads of the bones can the lesse enter into them. It fals out, that othersome have the ligaments, appointed by nature for fastening together the bones of the joynt, whether inserted or placed about, so weake, that from their first originall they are not of sufficient strength, or else abound with much phlegme, eyther bred together with them, or flowing from some other place; so that by their too much slipperinesse they lesse faithfully containe the knittings or articulations of the bones. In all these, as the bones are easily dislocated, so they may presently be easily restored without the assistance of a Surgeon, as I have sometimes observed in some.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Internall cau∣ses of disloca∣tions.
• * 1.2

  Externall causes.
• * 1.3

  Hereditary causes.
• * 1.4

  Sect 3. sent. 88. & 94 sect. 82. 4. sent. 3. & 4. lib. de art.
• * 1.5

  Children may have impo∣stumes in their mothers wombs.