This treatment of open joint, preventive as it is of arthritis, is also indicated in the case of open navicular bursa.  In several instances we have practised this treatment for the dressing of wounds implicating the bursae of tendons and the capsules of joints.  It is also spoken of favourably by Mr. C.H.  Flynn in the American Veterinary Review for June, 1888, whose treatment is as follows:  ’Place the patient in a clean, well-ventilated, and drained stable.  Have all the litter removed, and insist on the stall being kept clean.  Either place the animal in slings, or tie the head so as to prevent lying down.  Clip the hair and cleanse the parts well.  He prefers the corrosive sublimate solution (1 in 1,000).  Should the wound be of two or more days’ standing, inject the joint with the corrosive sublimate solution.  Now dry the parts with a clean towel and sprinkle the wound with iodoform.  Over this place a thick layer of absorbent cotton-wool, filled with iodoform, bandage securely, and keep the patient on a moderate diet, preserving the utmost quietude possible.  Should the bandage remain in position and the animal free from pain, leave the bandage and dressing in place from five days to a week.  Then change it, and should the discharge be little, do not disturb it, but renew the iodoform and cotton dressing, leaving it on for another week.’

Other treatments for the same condition are practised, in which the wound is dusted with powdered iodoform, with potassium permanganate, or with corrosive sublimate, or where the wound, instead of being dusted, has the corrosive sublimate applied in the form of a plug.  In each case the preliminary irrigation with the corrosive sublimate solution is dispensed with.  This, however, should on no account be omitted.  In our opinion it constitutes the very essence of the rationality of the treatment.

(b) Curative.—­It may happen, however, and often does, that this first injection of an antiseptic is unsuccessful in preventing organismal infection of the wound.  In this case grave constitutional disturbance and other untoward symptoms such as we have already described quickly make their appearance.

The animal should now be placed in slings and preparations made for actively treating the wound with antiseptics.  Whether we fail or not, we have the satisfaction of knowing that we have given to the patient the best and the only chance of recovery.

It should be remembered, however, and should be pointed out to the owner, that with purulent arthritis fully developed, with the grave constitutional changes it occasions, and with the ever-present danger of a general septic invasion of the blood-stream, that the human surgeon under such circumstances offers to his patient the alternatives of amputation or probable death.  With us no such alternative is possible.  It is either return the joint to some semblance of its former usefulness, or destroy the patient.