PLATE XI.A. DYSMENORRHOIC ORGANIZATIONS.
A pulpy tissue of a very loose texture, scarcely deserving of the name of membrane,—of a bright red colour when thrown off by the womb, but, soon after maceration in water, assuming a yellowish tint, and appearing like a gelatinous, thickish, and translucid web, the component molecules of which possess but slightly the power of cohesion, being easily lacerated. Examined with a powerful lens, it looks like a congeries of globules of gelatine, arranged together into a flat, but not even surface. It possesses flexibility, but scarcely any elasticity.
This tissue lines the womb; and the two superior tubes drawn up vertically in the preparation are the prolongations of that lining into the fallopian tubes.
It was thrown off in the case of a patient suffering habitually from dysmenorrhœa, after acute pain; and on the third day of a very scanty menstruation. The patient was not a married lady, and under twenty-five years of age. The same production had been observed on more than one occasion before by the attendant, but not especially noticed until after I began to visit the patient.
A pulpy tissue like the preceding,—rather firmer in its texture, but presenting in every other particular the same characters.
This also must have lined the uterus; for it was pulled away from the orifice of it, through which it was found to hang partially during an examination made in consequence of sharpforcingpains being experienced the day after the complete cessation of the menses. The patient, a marriedlady from Scotland, suffered considerably at every return of the monthly period, and had done so on the present occasion. She had had no children; and was thirty years of age.
Here, there were no tubular prolongations of the lining, but two apertures near to the upper margin of thiscloth, with smooth, rounded edges, as if they had corresponded with the uterine orifices of the fallopian tubes. A similar aperture, considerably larger, existed at the inferior margin; or rather, I should say, that the inferior margin of the cloth, perfectly smooth, was drawn round, so as to leave an opening in the centre, which must have been placed over the internal orifice of the womb.
Both this, and the preceding tissue had one of their surfaces morelissethan the other.