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INJURIES TO THE MUSCLES AND FASCIAE OF THE QUARTER. 
depending on the structures involved. Sometimes the lameness persists 
indefinitely, sometimes it rapidly disappears. The longer it persists the 
more remote becomes the hope of recovery. 
Treatment consists in the first stages in rest; if pain be present, hot 
fomentations often give relief; at a later stage massage and exercise are 
indicated. 
(b) Biuises and wounds are commonest in horses, especially in winter, 
and are caused by kicks and “treads” by the sharp heels of the shoe. 
They also lesult fiom thrusts with the carriage-pole, from falls on rough, 
liaid giound, oi fiom animals slipping in front of the carriage and being 
run over. Amongst tramway and omnibus horses extensive injury of the 
muscles of the quaitei is often produced in this way. In army horses 
wounds and bruises result from lance thrusts, sabre cuts, or failing on 
the rider’s spur. 
Blows may rupture large blood-vessels and produce extensive haemato- 
mata. Sometimes the skin and muscular tissue are torn through. The 
biceps femoris is often the seat of such injury, and in collisions the 
semi-tendinosus and semi-membranosus muscles are liable to be exten¬ 
sively injured. In heavy horses, wounds from stable-forks are often 
followed by septic cellulitis, which extends and produces destruction of 
the inteimuscular connective tissue of the buttock, sometimes even 
necrosis of the tuber ischii. After the cellulitis has subsided, sinuses 
may remain and give great trouble. 
Prognosis and treatment follow general principles, but one fact 
should always be borne in mind, viz., that the extravasation which 
follows bruising, and sometimes violent over-extension of muscle is 
seldom troublesome, if not too early incised. 
In fresh cases, continuous cold irrigations and complete rest are most 
useful. By putting the patients to work or moving them too early, fresh 
bleeding and increase of the haematoma are favoured. To assist 
resorption, small extravasations may, after the third or fourth day, be 
treated by massage ; in large ones, i.e., those containing a quart or more 
of fluid, such treatment is seldom beneficial, or takes longer than healing 
after successful puncture. Nevertheless, the knife should not be used 
before the fifth or sixth day after the appearance of swelling, partly 
because of the danger of after-bleeding, partly of infection and cellulitis. 
In five to six days thrombus formation is so far completed that bleeding 
is no longei piobable, and the vails of the haunatoma are sufficiently 
infiltrated with plastic material as to check the penetration of decompo¬ 
sition products. For the same reason, the opening should be made at the 
lowest point, the cavity emptied of coagulated blood as far as possible, 
and washed out with a disinfectant. A drainage-tube may be necessary! 
By adopting these precautions rapid healing is secured, and sometimes 
