26 COLICS AND THEIR TREATMENT 



colon. Experience has led me to believe that disturb- 

 ances of the former are exceedingly difficult, if indeed 

 they are not impossible to clearly differentiate from 

 trouble involving the folded colon, unless at times dis- 

 tinguishable through the exceedingly protracted period- 

 ical character of the pains and by rectal exploration. In 

 spite of this admission I believe it is quite within our 

 rights to suggest that the cecum is susceptible to dis- 

 turbances allied to those occurring in the colon and 

 though painstaking postmortem examinations have 

 failed to reveal cecal impactions to an extent of over- 

 loading. I have, on the other hand, found rupture of 

 that viscera presumably as a result of fecal stasis or of 

 gaseous accumulation, and believe the constant stretch- 

 ing of the walls of the cecum, together with pressure, so 

 impairs the local nutrition as to prompt necrotic areas 

 which readily account for the rupture. 



Considering jointly possible impaction of the cecum 

 and engorgement of the folded colon from an abnormal 

 accumulation of ingesta, we observe, together with the 

 general symptoms of colic, manifest by mild periodic, 

 colicky pains, a fullness of the abdomen, bracing of the 

 hind parts heavily against a convenient wall, couching 

 walk and hesitancy in lying down, diminished peristaltic 

 sounds and on rectal exploration a firm consistency of 

 the accumulated mass as well as a displacement of the 

 pelvic flexure of the colon, which in these cases lies 

 somewhat to the left of the rectum, having presumably, 

 as a result of its gravid state, become moved from the 

 normal position which is somewhat more anterior and 

 superior. The history of enforced idleness and free feed- 



