Page:A treatise on diseases of the bones (electronic resource) (IA b21289013).pdf/95

 CHAPTER VI.

ULCERATION OF BONE.

«“Tyere is, I believe,’ Mr. Hunter observes, “no difference between the ulceration of soft parts and of bone’” Although it is difficult to obtain clear evidence of a process in bone agreeing with the definition of ulcera- tion by Hunter, namely, “absorption attended with suppuration *,” yet, looking to the organic constitution of bone, we find, even in its compact tissue, the conditions essential to ulceration. Bone is certainly liable to a destructive process analogous to the ulceration of soft parts, and the varieties of ulcer in bone are as distinctly marked as they are in other tissues.

The ulceration of bone which is the effect of simple in- flammation in its tissue usually begins at a single point, and spreads equally in width and depth’. When, how- ever, the ulceration is consequent on inflammation of the periosteum, it spreads widely over the surface of the bone, but does not, in general, deeply penetrate its substance.

Syphilitic ulceration of bone usually begins at many


 * Lectures on the Principles of Surgery.

? Treatise on the Blood, Inflammation, &c. 3 Plate 4, fig, 3. �