The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1905-01-20
PAIN IN LOST LIMBS.
Physical Experiences by Which Sur
geons Are Sometimes Puzzled.

Physical Experiences by Which Sur
geons Are Sometimes Puzzled.
Three weeks ago Glen Bachelor of
Indiana lost both hands in a railway
accident. The amputated hands were
placed in a jar of alcohol and Mr..
Bachelors arms received the most care
full surgical attention. He suffered,
however, for two weeks from severe
and peculiar pains where the hands
formerly were.
Mr.. Bachelor insisted that his lost
hands were crowded in such a way as
to give him the senation of severe
cramping pains, and when he learned
how they had been disposed of he de-
manded that they be properly buried.
The hands were taken from the jar,
were Strengthened to a natural position,
were carefully wrapped, were incased
in a box and were buried. AS soon as
this was done Mr.. BacneIer was re-
lieyed of the pains that had kept him
in agony for two weeks.
The story will received with smiles
by the younger experts of the medical
profession, with shakes of the head by
the older surgeons and with ready be-
lief by hundreds of men who have suf-
fered as Mr.. Bachelor suffered,
Many man who has suffered ampu-
fntfnY1 nf
in anguish by the feeling of some OBJ
ject between the toes, by an intoler-
able itching where a toe ought to be.
or by a sharp rheumatic pain in the
ball Of a missing foot. A man who has
lost hand or an arm has been seized
suddenly with a distressing pain In the
limb or in the finger, and has. become
almost hysterical because he could not
relieve 1t by touching the hand that
was not there. sA,ss
Surgeons called to treat such cases
have contended that, the feeling was
simply hallucination; that men who
have suffered amputation have read
stories of queer sensations in lost
limbs, and that these stories have talk
en- such a hold upon, the imagination
that they experience the pain attribut-
ed to the men whose stories they have
read.
Acting on this theory the surgeon
falls in with the belief of the man, adj
ministers something to quiet his nerves
and, in cases where the missing hand
or missing foot is accessible, gives tli-
rection for its proper handling and in
ternent. -
However, this does not settle. the
case. In a week or month the man of
the lost foot has other trying expert
ences, and the surgeon tries to laugh
him out Of the hallucination. In good
time the patient apparently surrenders
his belief as to pain in the lost foot or
hand, but in his own heart he holds to
1t. He may not talk about it, but he
will insist that the, sensation in the
missing foot is so real and so exapera-a
ting that 1t at times drives him almost
to the point Of insanity. t IT,
There are strong men who have had
such experiences, and their. theory is
that some careless treatment of the
nerves severed In amputation is re
sponsible for the queer sensations. Al
few surgeons have admitted that there
may be something In this theory, but
IL 1t be admitted that the theory is
correct, 1t does not explain the sensa-
lions experienced by Mr.. Bachelor.
In this age, when the nerves Of men
and women receives more attention
from the medical profession than ever
before is 1t not a little strange that
these o-called-hallueination as to
sensations in missing members of the
body have not been more closely in-r
vestigated. Are these sensations the
work of the imagination, or are they,
the result Of real physical conditions?
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