This Article  • References  • Full text PDF  • Reply to article  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in this journal  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

ROBERT C. KRATZ, M.D.; FREDERICK A. STINE, M.D.; JOHN W. GROVER, M.D.; EDWARD J. STRATMAN, M.D.

AMA Arch Otolaryngol. 1959;70(6):692-695.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

Although the antibiotic era has lessened the incidence and improved the prognosis of neck suppurations, surgical drainage remains the definitive method of treatment.

In 1941, Weintraub¹ divided the retropharyngeal area into five separate spaces, namely, the paired right and left prevertebral spaces, the paired right and left peripharyngeal spaces, and, lying between the latter two, the unpaired postvisceral space. Infection in the postvisceral space may descend without any interfering barrier into the mediastinum, but infection in the prevertebral and peripharyngeal spaces is not likely to descend into the mediastinum.

I. Postvisceral Space

This space is located between the buccopharyngeal and the prevertebral fasciae and communicates freely with the posterior mediastinum. Furstenberg² describes a simple technique to drain this space and the mediastinum: An incision is made along the anterior border of the sternomastoid

Fig. 1.—The relationship of the pharyngeal space abscesses to the normal structures. Reproduced with permission . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
Fort Thomas, Ky.

From the Department of Otolaryngology, the University of Cincinnati Colloge of Medicine (Dr. Kratz).

Footnotes
Submitted for publication April 14, 1959.

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?