DISEASES OF THE FEMALE BLADDER AND URETHRA.
Up to the present time diseases of the urethra, bladder, and ure ters in women have been the most neglected field in the whole range of scientific medicine.
From the earliest times urinary affections in the male, although the organs are more inaccessible and the diseases consequently more difficult to treat, have commanded the painstaking attention of phy sicians and surgeons. These affections in the female on the other hand were either passed over on account of their similarity to those in the male, or the most obvious facts only, such as the comparative shortness of the female urethra, and the accessible position of the bladder and urethra in their relations to the Vagina, were pointed out. There is a groundwork of reason in this neglect, for the commoner urinary diseases of men are far more apt to prove dangerous to life.
A further reason for the present ignorance regarding diseases of the lower urinary tract in women is the fact that they have not been made the subject of exclusive study by specialists. Gynecologists, to whom these diseases have been relegated by common consent, have with but few exceptions, counted on one hand, slighted these cases as being difficult or impossible to diagnose and intractable to treat ment.
It is, however, a satisfaction to be able to say that this neglected branch of our art has finally been rescued from its obscurity by the methods which I shall describe in this article. Diseases of the bladder, ureters, and kidneys have now been brought within the easy range of intelligent diagnosis, so that without pain or injury to the patient, and without the intervention of any lens or mirror or fluid medium, the whole urinary tract in women may be examined and its diseases correctly diagnosed and successfully treated. Gynecology may now justly claim that at a single step this branch of the specialty has advanced beyond the kindred branch in male diseases.
Anatomy - FEMALE BLADDER AND URETHRA.
Some brief anatomical and physiological remarks concerning the urethra and bladder are a necessary preliminary to a consideration of the methods of examination and their pathological affections and treatment, but it is not my purpose to enter into the minute anatom ical descriptions, which will be found upon consulting such works as Sappey and Henle.