FIRST AID.

Otago Witness, Issue 2983, 17 May 1911, Page 94

FIRST AID.

[Alt. Rights Reserved.]

[All Rights Reserved.] WHAT TO DO TILL THE DOCTOR COMES. A Series of Simple and Helpful Hinte by the Late De W. Goiioom-Stables, R.N. 11.—MISHAPS TO CHILDREN. It is the best plan to send for a surgeon at once in case of any accident to a child, unless it be very trivial indeed, because it is impossible to say what it may lead to. But children, if not well looked after, are liable to many mishaps, which necessitate instant interference. When a messenger is dispatched for the doctor, he should be instructed to inform him of the nature of the accident, so that he may come if possible prepared for the emergency, whether by the use of the stomach pump or other instruments. THE EARS. Children frequently manage to insert foreign substances, such as peas, small buttons, or beads, into the ear, and these

may, with a little care, be extracted by means of a hairpin. If it be an insect such as an earwig or fly that has found its way inside, drop a little .sweet oil in, and afterwards have the ear syringed. If there be a doctor within- hall, take the child, to him; if not, it should be remembered that even so simple an operation as syringing must be carefully performed. If too much force be used, the drum may be injured.

The capital letter C (Fig. 2) makes a very good illustration of the shape of the human ear, the small letter "o" in the centre representing the outer orifice of the auditory canal. This canal is about an inch and a-quarter long, and leads to the drum. It is enough for the general reader to know that across the bottom of the outer canal or orifice is stretched a thin membrane, which forms the outside wall of the drum or middle ear, sometimes called the barrel. This drum is filled with air from a fine tube —the Eustachian — which runs down theft'e from to the back of the throat. When you make the motion of swallowing you can hear the air in the tube or drum, a slight crackling sound. But across the inside of the.-'drum is stretched a curious and minute chain of

bones (Fig 3), called the hammer, the anvil, and the stirrup, from their shape. These little bones might be said to represent the machinery in the lock of a revolver. It would be a revolver that could be fired thousands of times a. minute, for we might call every vibration of the air that acts upon the outer wall of the drum a shot. The found of vibration is conveyed by the works in the ear—namely, that chain of tiny bones—across the drum to its other side or skin, and acts on fluid in the circular canals of the inner ear, and vibrates the filaments of the nerve

of hearing by which the sound is conducted or transmitted to the brain and therein taken cognisance of. This is but a rough-and-ready description of the ear, I must confess; but it should show how very delicate and easily put- out of order the organs of hearing are, and how careful we should be neither to poke instruments nor 'ear-picks into them, nor trust ourselves to the ignorant treatment of what are called the deaf-quacks. THINGS SWALLOWED. If an article swallowed has gone down right to the stomach, we must treat according to circumstances. We should endeavour to ascertain what has actually been swallowed. If a marble or coin, it may necessitate surgical treatment or operation. If a poison, the treatment will depend upon what class it belongs to, irritant, narcotic, or narcotico-irritant. Poisons and their antidotes will be treated fully further on, for the same treatment holds good in children as in adults. If anything sharp has been swallowed, such as" a nail, a steel pen, or pin, give new bread, suet pudding, or thick porridge to protect the stomach against pricking. But the child may have swallowed simply something indigestible or deleterious, which may be got rid of by a vomit. The safest is a teaspoonful or dessertspoonful of mustard in hot water, a-fid tickling of the throat with a. feather. - —Things Lodging in the Throat. — Keep the mouth open and try to pull the foreign body out with the hooked forefinger or a blunt forceps, or failing this, endeavour to push it clown into the stomach. —Things in the Windpipe.— This is a very grave accident, owing to the danger of choking. But the article may be dislodged by the air in the lungs with gravitation, if the child be turned heels up and slapped on the back. In the case of something—generally a lump of food, a piece of apple, or, in old people, the artificial teeth —getting fixed at the entrance to the windpipe, retching may diisledge the obstruction, or vomiting and relief be brought about by the finger put down the throat in order to hook it up. But unconsciousness will speedily corns on if the dislodgment be not effected. Tracheotomy, or cutting open of the windpipe, in the middle line, may have to be performed. This is an operation which only the surgeon can be trusted to perform without great danger to life.