645 
A CASE OF TETANUS CURED BY CASTRATION. 
By M. G. Tisserand, M. U., Charnes sur Moselle. 
In the month of August 1838,1 saw a young horse, three years 
and a half old, in good condition, and designed as a carriage horse, 
that presented indubitable characters of essential and general te¬ 
tanus. During eight days I employed on him the most energetic 
revulsive treatment, as sinapisms, frictions, vesicatories, setons, 
and drastic purgatives, but, in my opinion, he Avas growing worse 
every day. Not knowing what course to pursue, and considering 
the horse, in fact, as lost, I bethought me of a case which had been 
published of tetanus having been cured by castration. I went to 
the proprietor, and induced him to consent that he should be cas¬ 
trated by simple excision, followed by cauterization. 
The operation was performed, and in a very few minutes the 
tetanic spasms begun very perceptibly to decrease in intensity. 
During the eight following days they continued to disappear until 
the cure was complete. While this was going on he received only 
the common care of a colt that had been castrated. He was then 
taken into work, and never afterwards exhibited any tetanic symp¬ 
tom. 
I do not know whether cases of this kind have been numerous, 
but very few have been published. I therefore relate the simple 
fact, without venturing to assert that, under analogous circum¬ 
stances, the result would be so favourable. It would be a most 
desirable thing for the experiment to be tried, as often as circum¬ 
stances will permit, on horses of inferior value. Perhaps the re¬ 
vulsion produced by an operation so painful as that of castration 
would not be so empirical as some are disposed to imagine. At 
all events, in a desperate case, and the patient being valuable, the 
veterinary surgeon would be supported by the opinion and consent 
of the owner, and there would not be much more danger in the 
operation on a tetanic horse than on a violent one without disease. 
In the district in which M. Tisserand resides, however, the repu¬ 
tation of the veterinary surgeon would not be so much in danger, 
since custom, from time immemorial, has placed this operation in 
the hands of the gelder, who traverses every part of the country, 
and with whose supposed right neither the medical man nor the 
proprietor of the animal would dare to interfere. 
In the Editor’s Lecture on Tetanus, reported in the eighth volume 
of The Veterinarian, a lengthened and interesting account is 
given of the perfectly successful exhibition of this counter-irritant. 
On the fifteenth day after the operation the horse was dismissed 
cured. 
