STENOSIS OF THE CERVICAL CANAL.
For the treatment of stenosis (including atresia) of the cervical canal the galvanic current would seem, from the testimony of those who have tested it, to be preferable to either incision or dilatation. Engelmann claims that it is the "mainstay of the surgeon." Comparing it with other methods he says: " For the relief of stenosis, acute or chronic, whether of recent date or of years' standing, this method is preferable to all others; it is not only painless, but at once eases if it does not com pletely relieve such pain as may at the time exist. Compare with it other means of treatment; slow or rapid dilatation, the tent, sponge or tupelo, or the steel dilator. The tent is of little use in a very narrow canal, impossible often, and when used causes great pain, necessitates the bed, and results in hardly more than a temporary dilatation; when applied directly before the menstrual period it gives relief, but it must be used steadily for a time, and such treatment confines the patient to bed, and the result is but temporary. Likewise that of the steel dilator, an instrument which causes suffering at the time, and to be effective con fines the patient to her lied. The knife gives comparatively favorable results, but this necessitates a small operation, and cicatricial contraction may even do away with all benefit accomplished."' In his hands 100
milliamperes have proved necessary for " positive effective action," the negative being, of course, the internal pole. He records a number of eases where stenosis was thus cured. Rockwell also favors the method, but he deems 50 milliamperes used for five minutes, ample. In the cases he has thus treated he has found from six to twenty-five applications sufficient to effect a cure.
Although these statements speak strongly in favor of electricity they do not warrant the inference that the permanent results are at all better than those obtainable from thorough divulsion. The chief advantage, indeed, which the former would seem to possess over the latter, is the fact that it neither requires anesthesia nor rest in bed. The preferable method we think is to divulge and then to improve nutrition by frequent galvanization. In this connection, however, as elsewhere when speaking of electricity as applied to the diseases of women, the time is not ripe for definite statement, since only a very limited number of observers have at all tested the agent.