DISEASES FOLLOWING PARTURITION. 



By James Law. F. R. C. V. S., 

 Formerly Professor Veterinary Science, etc., in Cornell University. 



FLOODING (BLEEDING FROM THE WOMB). 



Though not so common in the cow as in the human female, flooding 

 is sufficiently frequent to demand attention. It may depend on a too 

 rapid calving and a consequent failure of the womb to contract when 

 the calf has been removed. The pregnant womb is extraordinarily 

 rich in blood vessels, especially in large and tortuous veins, which 

 become compressed and almost obliterated under contraction, but 

 remain overfilled and often bleed into the cavity of the womb should 

 no contraction take place. Cox records cases in which the labor 

 pains had detached and expelled the fetal membranes, while the 

 calf, owing to large size or wrong presentation, was detained in the 

 womb, and the continued dilatation of the womb in the absence of 

 the fetal membranes led to a flow of blood which accumulated in 

 clots around the calf. Other causes are laceration of the cotyledons 

 of the womb, or from an antecedent inflammation of the placenta, 

 and the unnatural adhesion of the membranes to the womb, which 

 bleeds when the two are torn apart. Weakness of the womb from 

 overdistention, as in dropsy, twins, etc., is not without its influence. 

 Finally, eversion of the womb (casting the withers) is an occasional 

 cause of flooding. The trouble is only too evident when the blood 

 flows from the external passages in drops or in a fine stream. When 

 it is retained in the cavity of the womb, however, it may remain 

 unsuspected until it has rendered the animal almost bloodless. The 

 symptoms in such case are paleness of the eyes, nose, mouth, and of 

 the lips of the vulva, a weak, rapid pulse, violent and perhaps loud 

 beating of the heart (palpitations), sunken, staring eyes, coldness 

 of the skin, ears, horns, and limbs, perspiration, weakness in stand- 

 ing, staggering gait, and, finally, inability to rise, and death in con- 

 vulsions. If these symptoms are seen, the oiled hand should be in- 

 troduced into the womb, which will be found open and flaccid and 

 containing large blood clots. 



Treatment. — Treatment consists in the removal of the fetal mem- 

 branes and blood clots from the womb (which will not contract while 

 they are present), the dashing of cold water on the loins, right flank, 

 and vulva, and if these measures fail, the injection of cold water into 

 the womb through a rubber tube furnished with a funnel. In obsti- 



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