60 COLICS AND THEIR TREATMENT 



the stomach and puncture of the colon if the bloating is 

 threatening. 



Cathetrization of the stomach is practiced extensively 

 in this country, but in spite of its merits as a radical cure 

 it has by no means been universally adopted as the stand- 

 ard intervention against an overloaded stomach, as it 

 should have been long ago. 



Here is an operation that goes to the "fountain-head" 

 of the trouble and without ceremony removes it from the 

 body. To fight a stubborn fermentation in such a mass 

 of chyme and then start the whole volume through its 

 long course to the rectum by means of drugs seems 

 criminal with such a splendid operation available. 



Those who have practiced this operation have little 

 patience with the uncertain and slow medical treatment. 

 Stomach cathetrization not only evacuates the harmful 

 contents, but it also lowers the abdominal tension, and 

 besides the dilution of the chyme with water controls the 

 fermentation more effectually than any other form of 

 antiferment treatment, and leaves what remains of the 

 mass in a better physical condition for the intestines to 

 handle. And often animals almost dead from acute in- 

 digestion, destined by medical treatment to go through a 

 prolonged agony, followed by death or sometimes to end 

 in laminitis, are cured immediately and ready for work 

 in a few hours. 



The Single Stomach Tube Favored 



The first question usually asked in connection with 

 stomach catherization is : "Which is the better tube, the 

 single or the double one?" And the second query is in- 

 variably an inquiry as to the better route through which 



