FRACTURES. 301 



be sufficient for its development, after much rougher handling has 

 failed to discover it. Perhaps the failure in the latter case is due to 

 a sort of defensive spasmodic rigidity caused by the pain resulting 

 from the rude interference. 



More or less reactive fever is a usual accompaniment of a fracture. 

 Ecchymosis in the parts is but a natural occurrence, and is more 

 easily discovered in animals possessing a light-colored and delicate 

 skin than in those of the opposite character. 



There are difficulties in the way of the diagnosis of an incomplete 

 fracture, even sometimes when there is a degree of impairment in the 

 function of locomotion, with evidences of pain and swelling at the 

 seat of lesion. There should then be a careful examination for evi- 

 dences of a blow or other violence sufficient to account for the frac- 

 ture, though very often a suspicion of its existence can only be con- 

 verted into a certainty by a minute history of the patient if it can be 

 obtained up to the moment of the occurrence of the injury. A diag- 

 nosis ought not to be hastily pronounced, and where good ground 

 for suspicion exists it ought not to be rejected upon any evidence 

 less than the best. Serious and fatal complications are too often 

 recorded of the results following careless conclusions in similar cases, 

 among which we may refer to one instance of a complete fracture 

 manifesting itself in an animal during the act of rising up in his 

 stall after a decision had been pronounced that he had no fracture 

 at all. 



Fractures are of course liable to complications, especially those 

 which are of a traumatic character, such as extensive lacerations, tear- 

 ing of tissues, punctures, contusions, etc. Unless these are in com- 

 munication with the fracture itself the indication is to treat them sim- 

 ply as independent lesions upon other parts of the body. A traumatic 

 emphysema will at times cause trouble, and abscesses, more or less 

 deep and diffused, may follow. In some cases small bony fragm^ents 

 from a comminuted fracture, becoming loose and acting as foreign 

 bodies, give rise to troublesome fistulous tracts. A frequent compli- 

 cation is hemorrhage, which often becomes of serious consequence. 

 A fracture in close proximity to a joint may be accompanied by dan- 

 gerous inflammations of important organs, and induce an attack of 

 pneumonia, pleurisy, arthritis, etc., especially if situated near the chest ; 

 it may also cause luxations, or dislocations. Gangrene^ as a conse- 

 quence of contusions or of hemorrhage or of an impediment to the 

 circulation, caused by unskillfuUy applied apparatus, must not be 

 overlooked among the occasional incidents ; nor must lockjaw, which 

 is not an uncommon occurrence. Even founder, or laminitis, has been 

 met with as the result of forced and long-continued immobility of 

 the feet in the standing posture, as one of the involvements of 

 unavoidably protracted treatment. 



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