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