Give us some sugar! Not that kind of sugar! Learn more about the pancreas tomorrow in Anatomy Lesson #50: Care for us – Oh Pancreas!
A deeply grateful,
Outlander Anatomist
Fun Fact: extensor digitorum
Anatomy def: Extensor digitorum (ED) is a muscle of the back of forearm that straightens four fingers (index, middle, ring, little), wrist, and elbow. It also slightly separates the fingers as it extends them.
Outlander def: The insult to injury muscle! Jamie’s puir fingers, smashed by Malicious-Mallet, are then slashed by Dougal-Dirk! A hair deeper and the blade would have severed his ED tendons! No repair possible in 18th century – Jamie would have permanently lost his grip. His days of Warrior-Work would have ended!
Learn about ED muscle in Anatomy Lesson #22, Jamie’s Hand – Symbol of Sacrifice. Extensor digitorum is more precisely known as extensor digitorum communis (EDC) to underscore the sharing of four tendons by a single muscle.
Read about Jamie’s battered digits and Claire’s fastidious repairs in Diana’s first big book, Outlander:
What has he done to you?” I asked ……Moving with exquisite care, he used his left hand to lift the object he had been cradling… It was his right hand, almost unrecognizable as a human appendage.
…A single broken finger is enough to sink a strong man to his knees with nauseated pain…
It was a long, horrible, nerve-wracking job….. some parts, such as the splinting of the two fingers with simple fractures, went quite easily. Others did not….All five fingers eventually lay straight as new pins, stiff as sticks in their bandaged splints…
See Dougal slice Jamie’s digits in Starz episode 213, Dragonfly in Amber.
A deeply grateful,
Outlander Anatomist
Fun Fact: Penetrating Wound
Anatomy Def: Penetrating wounds are open wounds that pierce the skin and penetrate underlying tissues.
Outlander Def: One of Claire’s fav wounds. Her nimble fingers, aided with scalpel, extracts a wooden shard from a hapless hand! Murtagh serves as surgical assistant. Go for it, Nurse Sassynach!
Learn more about penetrating wounds in Anatomy Lesson #35, Outlander Owies! – Part One. Two types of penetrating wounds occur. If the penetrating object stays in the body, then it is “just” a penetrating wound; if it passes through the body then it becomes a perforating wound.
Read about a penetrating wound to the thigh of a hapless homme in Diana’s spectacular second big book, Dragonfly in Amber!
A long sliver of wood, flying free of the splintered cartwheel, had driven upward, deep into the thigh… the deeper wound had festered and formed a pocket of pus around the intrusion, buried in the muscle tissue where no surface symptoms were visible.… A little scalpel work to enlarge the entrance wound, a quick grip with a pair of long-nosed forceps, a smooth, forceful pull—and I held up a three-inch sliver of wood, coated with blood and slime.
See Claire’s deft fingers remove the penetrating object and treat the penetrating wound in Starz episode 114, The Search. But, if you want to really get grossed out, watch the extraction of the penetrating object from an infected thigh in Starz episode 203, Useful Occupations and Deceptions – this scene matches the book quote. Terrific special effects!
A deeply grateful,
Outlander Anatomist